ISLAMABAD: The country has witnessed 4.9 per cent decrease in the exports to $23.9 billion during the recently ended fiscal year, which is lowest in four-year.
According to the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS), the country exported goods worth $23.9 billion during the last financial year 2014-15, which were $1.3 billionless than the previous fiscal year. It was also the lowest number since 2011-12 when the country had exported goods worth $23.6 billion.
The country’s exports are falling at a time when its regional peers are increasing their shares in global trade. Pakistan’s exports amount to only 0.15% of the global receipts from exports.
While the exports dropped by almost 5%, the imports in the same period grew on an average of 2.1% to $46 billion, widening the trade deficit by 10.7%.
For the last fiscal year, the government had targeted to increase the exports to $27 billion -a mark that it missed by a margin of $3.1 billion. The imports also exceeded the target by $1.9 billion. Resultantly, the gap between imports and exports stood at $22.2 billion, which was $5.2 billion higher than the official estimates.
In the last fiscal year, the exports had to be increased to $37.5 billion to achieve the overarching goal, which it missed by a margin of $13.6 billion. The trend is going to continue.
Although the government has projected the exports to grow to $25.5 billion by end of this year, the IMF estimates show that export receipts will marginally increase to $24.5 billion. Similarly, the IMF has portrayed a negative growth in imports and has estimated that the imports will remain around $40 billion this year.
