Month: January 2023

The Petroleum Division’s top mandarins have carved out a multi-pronged strategy to resolve the circular debt in the oil and gas sector that has surged to Rs1,500 billion, mainly through improving the balance sheets of Public Sector Entities (PSEs) involved in the petroleum sector, a senior official of the Energy Ministry told The News. Through netting off dividends of the government in profit-making entities to loss-making entities, the circular debt of Rs850 billion will be settled in the balance sheets and the remaining Rs650 billion will be settled with an…

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Pakistan on Monday raised more than $9 billion at an international conference seeking support for its recovery from last year’s devastating floods — a billion more than requested. The pledges came as the International Conference on Climate Resilient Pakistan kicked off in Geneva. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif co-hosted the conference along with United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres. The purpose of the day-long moot — attended by heads of state and government and other stakeholders — was to marshal international support to rehabilitate the population affected by super floods and reconstruct damaged…

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Chairman National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) Tauseef Hassan Farooqi, while expressing sheer disappointment over the performance of Discos across Pakistan including K-Electric (KE), stated that KE, being a private entity was better as compared to other Discos as KE has drastically brought down Transmission & Distribution (T&D) losses from more than 40 percent to 15.5 percent but the biggest dilemma was that they have failed to improve the power generation. “Technology and competition were the only way forward. Technology is already there but the competition is missing. As KE’s…

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The independent Economic Advisory Group (EAG) is concerned that the recent National Security Council (NSC) statement has failed to address the challenges Pakistan is currently facing. The lack of emphasis on the need to address the increasing external debt servicing burden, and endorsing antiquated policies such as import substitution as a way forward, does not restore confidence. Winston Churchill is famously credited for saying, “Never let a good crisis go to waste.” It is for policymakers to decide if they will use the ongoing crisis as an opportunity to transform…

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The pace of domestic debt accumulation further accelerated by 6 percent during this fiscal year (FY23) and reached an all-time high level of Rs 33 trillion mark end of November 2022. According to the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), the government’s domestic debt rose by 6 percent during the first five months of this fiscal year. Total domestic debt stocks reached historical level of Rs 32.929 trillion at the end of Nov 22 compared to Rs 31.037 trillion in June 22, depicting an increase of Rs 1.9 trillion. Year on…

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