January 10, 2023 (MLN): The cash-strapped economy is deprived of around $2.5 billion from IT exports that are not remitted to Pakistan, Pakistan Business Council (PBC) indicated through its official Twitter handle on Tuesday.
In order to increase the remittances, the council suggested export rebates on services similar to those on goods which will incentivize the remittance of the documented exports of services.
In a series of Tweets, PBC further advised the government to consider floater bonds to stem the outflow from Naya Pakistan Certificates.
Also, conversion of existing fixed-rate NPCs to floater bonds.
The country is severely affected by the melting foreign exchange reserves which stood at a historically low level. Thus, to anchor, this dilemma, the advocacy body of Pakistan’s largest private sector recently stressed the need to secure immediate liquidity by expediting/ enhancing the current IMF program by factoring in the impact of floods.
Council acknowledged that whilst the IMF program is critical to restoring the confidence of friendly nations to provide assistance, in itself, the IMF program is not sufficient to meet debt obligations unless they are significantly restructured, nor provide the space to implement fundamental reforms.
