Pakistan won't meet $32bn exports target!
Business
Country continues seeing huge reduction in trade deficit
ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) – The latest official figures show that Pakistan is unlikely to meet the $32 billion exports target for the outgoing financial year. But, at the same time, the country has been witnessing a huge reduction in trade deficit.
According to the monthly data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS), the total volume of exports during the July-May period – the first 11 months of 2022-23 – stood at $25.36 billion, meaning there is a shortfall of around $6.64 billion while the country only has one more month of June to go.
Meanwhile, the exports target set for 2023-24 – the next financial year – is $30 billion – a $2 billion reduction when compared with 2022-23.
This inability to meet the target is best explained by the reduction in textile exports. The reasons are multiple, ranging from the high cost of production to the reduced worldwide demand due to inflation and the resultant shrinking purchasing power of consumers who resetting their priorities.
Read more: Pakistan's textile exports plummet to $13.7bn YoY
However, there is some good news too as there has been a 40 per cent reduction in trade deficit when compared with the corresponding period of the last fiscal year – 2021-22.
So the trade deficit during the first 11 months of the current fiscal year – 2022-23 – was recorded at $25.79 billion against the figures of $43.40 billion for 2021-22.
The reason behind this drop are the shrinking imports which declined to the level of $51 billion during the same period.
As far as the data for the previous month is concerned, the total volume of exports and imports stood at $2.18 billion and $4.27 billion respectively.
