Chairman Economic Policy and Business Development (EPBD) think tank Gohar Ejaz has warned that Pakistan is standing at a crossroads between \u201ccompetitiveness or stagnation\u201d as crippling interest rates, soaring energy costs and heavy taxation continue to suffocate industrial growth.<\/p>\n
Ejaz said Pakistan\u2019s economic model has become fundamentally uncompetitive, with key input costs \u201croughly double\u201d those of neighboring countries. He noted that despite efforts over the last 36 months to stabilize the economy, the country has managed less than 2% aggregate growth, while the rupee has went from Rs160 to Rs280 per dollar and exports remain stuck at $30 billion.<\/p>\n
Ejaz criticized the policy stance, pointing out that while China and India maintain policy rates below 5% \u2014 with real interest rates under 1% \u2014 Pakistan\u2019s Monetary Policy Committee has kept its policy rate at a staggering 11%, choking businesses and pushing industries to the brink. \u201cThis is eroding industrial competitiveness, suppressing growth, and keeping the economy on a ventilator with no export expansion,\u201d he warned.<\/p>\n
He added that the current policy mix is effectively throttling Pakistan\u2019s manufacturing base at a time when regional economies are powering ahead with cheaper energy, lower taxes and business-friendly interest rates.
\nEjaz urged the government to slash energy tariffs to 9 cents and cap taxation at a maximum slab of 20%, all within the next six months to match regional benchmarks.<\/p>\n
He stressed that such adjustments would not only revive industrial competitiveness and unlock export growth but also slash government debt servicing by Rs3 trillion per year, easing pressure on Pakistan\u2019s strained public finance.<\/p>\n
Ejaz urged for slashing the benchmark interest rate to 6%, while claiming that lowering the interest rate alone could save the government Rs3 trillion annually in debt servicing. \u201cThe only path to sustainable recovery is to bring industrial costs in line with the region,\u201d he stressed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Chairman Economic Policy and Business Development (EPBD) think tank Gohar Ejaz has warned that Pakistan is standing at a crossroads between \u201ccompetitiveness or stagnation\u201d as crippling interest rates, soaring energy costs and heavy taxation continue to suffocate industrial growth. Ejaz said Pakistan\u2019s economic model has become fundamentally uncompetitive, with key input costs \u201croughly double\u201d those …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":6801,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15333","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15333","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15333"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15333\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15334,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15333\/revisions\/15334"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}