ISLAMABAD: The federal government and IMF are resuming talks on Monday for the approval of pending ninth review.
A senior official of the Finance Division said that the government has shared with IMF the important details of the upcoming talks.
The financial matters to be further discussed in the upcoming meetings are:
- Fiscal consolidation, including taking additional taxation measures and curtailing expenditures to restrict the budget deficit within the envisaged limit agreed with the IMF
- Enforcement of corrective measures to devise a sustainable road-map for cash bleeding energy sector such as curtailing flow and stocks of the circular debt, hiking tariffs of electricity and gas sectors;
- Bringing the exchange rate aligned to the free market mechanism
The IMF mission chief has confirmed about their availability for virtual meetings from next week. A review mission of IMF would also reach Pakistan at the crucial stage of the finalization of the programme.
“If all issues are resolved in virtual meetings, the staff-level agreement could be finalized without paying a physical visit in the next seven to 15 days,” a senior official said.
The IMF had already asked Finance Division to prepare an agreement on the Memorandum of Financial Policies (MEFP) for signing a staff-level agreement, he added.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has urged the IMF top officials to soften some of the conditions keeping in view catastrophic floods and record inflation in the country.
I am an experienced writer, analyst, and author. My exposure in English journalism spans more than 28 years. In the past, I have been working with daily The Muslim (Lahore Bureau), daily Business Recorder (Lahore/Islamabad Bureaus), Daily Times, Islamabad, daily The Nation (Lahore and Karachi). With daily The Nation, I have served as Resident Editor, Karachi. Since 2009, I have been working as a Freelance Writer/Editor for American organizations.
