The country can run only through taxes, and there is no more sacred cow in this regard: Finance Minister
Web Desk (Tuesday, June 11, 2024)
Detailing Economic Survey of Pakistan 2023-24, Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb said that everyone has to contribute to the country’s economy because schools, hospitals, colleges and universities can be run through charity work, but it cannot run the country.
Taking Tax Collection Towards Digitization, Finance Minister Mohammad Aurangzeb said that he will proceed on the principle of ensuring the implementation of the policy, taking the tax collection towards digitalization, reducing the human intervention, and adedd that the government will look into why the track and trace system is not working.
Talking about capacity charges for electricity bills, the finance minister noted that the consumption of electricity increases, the burden of capacity charges will also decrease. According to Nepra’s report, the consumers of all discos are also suffering from over-billing.
According to the economic survey, the public debt in the financial year 2024 from July to March was 4 thousand 644 billion rupees, which was 10 thousand 5 billion rupees in the same period of the previous financial year.
Privatization of Steel Mills
The finance minister said that government institutions cannot afford a loss of one thousand billion rupees, there is no possibility of restoring the steel mills, they will only be sold as scrap.
He said that we will see the result of privatization of PIA by July-August, we will not stop until the privatization of Islamabad Airport.
Agriculture, growth rate was 6.25%
According to the Economic Survey, the economic growth rate increased due to good performance in the agriculture sector, the growth rate of the agriculture sector during the fiscal year 2023-24 was 6.25 percent. This is the highest growth in the agriculture sector in the last 19 years.
The survey stated that the improvement in wheat, rice and cotton crops led to growth in the agriculture sector and the growth rate in the agriculture sector during the financial year 2023-24 was 6.25 percent.
During the fiscal year 2023-24, cotton production increased by 108 percent and produced 10.2 million bales.
Rice production increased by 34.8% to 9.87 million tonnes, wheat production also increased by 11.6% to 31.44 million tonnes.
The share of livestock in agriculture sector was 60.84% while the share of livestock in GDP was 14.63%, the growth rate of livestock sector was 3.89%.
Presenting the economic survey, the finance minister said that when the collection of FBR increased by 30% earlier, we can increase the collection next year as well, the decisions of NEC have been reviewed.
The minister also noted that we will follow the debt repayment schedule, next year there will be no major problem of debt repayment, microeconomic stability is needed, Panda bonds can be sold in the next financial year.
