China a great economic supporter of Pakistan: Planning Minister

Islamabad: Minister for Planning and Development Ahsan Iqbal has said that China was a great economic supporter of Pakistan.

Addressing the inauguration of Pakistan Institute of Development Economics (PIDE) RASTA (path) conference here, Iqbal mentioned that when no one in the world was ready to invest even a single penny, China came forward and made investment worth of billions of Dollars under China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).

He reminded that in 1980 the per capita income of China was US $200 while that of Pakistan was $380.

“Similarly, in 1960, Pakistan’s exports were $200 million while now it had hardly reached $25 billion. South Korean exports, on the other hand reached over $700 billion now from mere $100 million in 1960,” he added.

But unfortunately, he said, there was no significant investment in the country under CPEC during previous four years due to flawed policies by Pakistan.

He directed PIDE to do research work that how to take maximum benefits from the mega project of CPEC.

The minister says that besidesChina, Pakistan’s economic development was also linked with good relations with its strategic partners including US, Europe and Gulf States.

“If we want to see our country developing fast, we will have to maintain good relations with these countries,” Ahsan Iqbal contended.

Iqbal underscored thatPakistan’s development journey was moving in a circle.

The minister feared that if “we do not come out of that circle, we will be even behind Afghanistan when we will be celebrating 100 years of independence day in 1947.”

He maintained that one thing was common among the countries who were developing fast that is political stability, continuity of policies and rule of law.

The countries with no stability and with discontinuities of the policies could never develop, he opined.

“If there are reversal of policies every now and then, then how far we hire the most efficient and intelligent people, we will not be able to develop economically,” the minister said,

The minister noted that the current fiscal year’s development budget was Pakistani Rs 900 billion, but by the last quarter of the year, it confined to only Rs 500 billion and the finance division had no funds to release for the development projects under Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) 2021-22.