Pakistan: Selected Issues

IMF Staff Country Reports, October 10, 2024

Source details

Canonical URL

Pakistan: Selected Issues

Other formats

• Markdown version
• Structured JSON version
• Bundle manifest

Bibliographic details

• Published: October 10, 2024
• Series: IMF Staff Country Reports
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.5089/9798400291036.002

Overview and main findings

• Focus: economic performance and the road ahead in Pakistan.
• Core finding: Pakistan’s economy and living standards have lagged behind its regional peers for well over a decade.
• Identified macroeconomic distortions and policy-related restrictions contributing to underperformance:
  • protectionist interventions;
  • a cumbersome regulatory and fiscal environment;
  • insufficient investment in human capital.
• Opportunities highlighted:
  • achieve efficiency gains;
  • reallocate resources toward more technologically advanced goods and services;
  • improve productivity and standards of living across the country.
• Modeling results in the accompanying Selected Issues suggest significant macroeconomic gains from implementing a distortion-reducing reforms agenda.

Policy recommendations and reform priorities

• Place Pakistan on a new economic trajectory by:
  • addressing many distortions tied to the old growth strategy;
  • improving the quality and level of public investment, including investment in human capital.
• Key reforms center on removing remnants of the old growth strategy based around protection, preferences, and concessions.
• Emphasis on a distortion-reducing reforms agenda to deliver macroeconomic gains (as suggested by the paper’s modeling).

Themes and analytical scope

• Subject areas covered:
  • Commercial banks;
  • Expenditure;
  • Financial institutions;
  • Government debt management;
  • Macrostructural analysis;
  • Public debt;
  • Public financial management (PFM);
  • Public investment spending;
  • Structural reforms.
• Keywords referenced in the paper:
  • C. DIGNAR result;
  • climate adaptation investment in Pakistan;
  • climate resilience scenario;
  • Commercial banks;
  • DIGNAR model specification;
  • Global;
  • Government debt management;
  • nexus in Pakistan;
  • Public investment spending;
  • Structural reforms.

Content in this bundle

• Pakistan: Selected Issues; IMF Country Report No. 24/311; September 11, 2024
  • Pakistan: Selected Issues; IMF Country Report No. 24/311; September 11, 2024 (Markdown version)
  • Pakistan: Selected Issues; IMF Country Report No. 24/311; September 11, 2024 (PDF)