Pakistan’s economy is expected to make an upward jump from 2021 onwards as increased industrialization, expanded investment and progressive drives by the government begin to bear fruit.

Continued commitment to reforms combined with productive investment and strategic capacity development will be pivotal for the country to find its way towards the growth path. 2020 will go down the annals of history remembered mostly for COVID-19 pandemic, which hardly left any part of the world unaffected. From the social vantage point, it caused a decisive change in everyone’s life patterns. However, due to the Pakistani government’s consistent efforts, the country has been able to get back on track and is showing clear signs of recovery.

 

Pakistan is projected to experience a broad economic recovery in the fiscal year 2021 as the economic sentiment improves with the resumption of structural reforms.

 

Since the removal of Coronavirus related restrictions; the country has witnessed a rapid recovery of exports. Consequently, the outbound shipments from Pakistan in recent months outnumbered that of regional competitors, Bangladesh and India.

 

December shipments rose to USD 2.4 billion as compared to USD 2.2 billion in November 2020, a month on month increase of 8.9 percent, and by 19.0 percent as compared to USD 1.99 billion in December 2019. By comparison, India’s exports went down by 9.1 percent in November. In December 2020, India’s exports totaled USD 26.9 billion a marginal decrease of 0.8 percent compared to the previous year’s figure of USD 27.1 billion.

 

Total Indian exports in April-December 2020 amounted to USD 200.6 billion, a decline of 15.8 percent from USD 238.3 billion during the same period in 2019. Bangladeshi exports showed a nominal increase of 0.8 percent to reach USD 3.07 billion in November 2020 from USD 3.05 billion.

 

The country’s overall exports in July-November 2020 stood at USD 15.92 billion, marking a 0.9 percent rise from USD 15.77 billion during the same period in 2019.

 

Textile’s value-added sector remained the main engine of growth for the economy as its exports registered an increase of 22.72 percent to an unprecedented high of USD 1.40 billion as compared to USD 1.14 billion in December 2019 and increased by 9.2 percent when compared to USD 1.28 billion in November 2020. Pakistan’s textile exports increased by 7.8 percent to USD 7.4 billion in July-December against USD 6.9 billion in the same period last year.

 

Textile commodities that contributed to positive trade growth included knitwear exports, which increased to USD 1.9 billion during the first half of FY2021 compared to USD 1.6 billion last year. Likewise, bed wear exports increased by 16.4 percent to USD 1.4 billion, and towels’ exports increased by 17.5 percent to USD 445.7 million.

 

Source: globalvillagespace.com