Foreign economic assistance drops by 89% in April

May 28, 2019 (MLN):  To promote economic and social development in the country, Pakistan has received nearly $330.5 million economic assistance in the form of bilateral and multilateral foreign loans and grants in the month of April 2019, reported the Economic Affairs Division (EAD) in its monthly report on disbursement of foreign assistance.

Compared to last month, the disbursement in April 2019 diminished by 89%.

The total loan and grant disbursement from July through April of FY19 stood at $8.8 billion for budgetary support, project financing and meeting external financing requirements. This 10-month disbursements are about 91% of the budgetary estimate of $9.7 billion for the year.

Foreign assistance extended from multilateral sources during the month adds up to $115 million, with the IDA and IDB (S-term) emerging as the main source having lent $40 million and $34.8 million repetitively.

On cumulative basis, during 10MFY19, IDB (S-term) appeared as the highest source of multilateral financing with an assistance of $572.3 million.

The second highest source of multilateral financing is ADB with an assistance of $406.7 million in July-April FY19 period.

Another significant source of assistance was IDA with a cumulative disbursement of $205.8 million.

Similarly, other multilateral lenders like AIIB, IBRD and IFAD etc. also provided necessary budgetary and project-related support to Pakistan.

The total disbursement from multilateral sources in ongoing fiscal year so far, has been recorded at $1.3 billion, which is about 39% of the budget estimate of $3.4 billion for the whole year.

Coming to bilateral foreign loans, the government of China and its financial institutions provided nearly $2 billion or 86% of the total bilateral loans received during the 10 months of the current fiscal year. In addition to this, in the month of April China disbursed around $115 million.

Moreover, UK and France disbursed around $80 million and $66.5 million respectively in July-April FY19.

Overall, Pakistan has collectively received a sum of $2.3 billion as bilateral loans, which largely exceeds the budget estimate by $1 billion.

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