Climate-change and man-made calamities need a comprehensive response from the government on policy and reform level so that they are pre-emptively taken care of in the future. The observation was made by the State Minister for Finance and Revenue Ayesha Ghaus Pasha during a meeting of National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Finance and Revenue held under the chairmanship of Member of National Assembly Qasier Ahmed Sheikh. “Our country is going through some very difficult times.

These difficult times have been made worse by the climate catastrophe that hit us in the form of floods. However, our government is taking some very hard decisions to rectify the situation and improve the state of economy,” she said. “Almost 9 million people have been pushed below the poverty line in the wake of this year’s floods. Our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will come down by almost 2% in the fiscal year 2022-23 because of these floods,” she continued. She further informed that the government is consulting all the partners and stakeholders to get help because the costs of the floods will exceed USD 16 billion.

Other multilateral institutions, she added, have put the economic costs of the floods at upwards of USD 30 billion. Ayesha Ghaus Pasha told the meeting that talks with multilateral institutions are underway and certain programs will soon be frontloaded. Pakistan is expecting a positive response from Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, she added. “Our planning ministry is in consultations with the World Bank to estimate the losses of the recent floods. Preliminary estimates have put them at upwards of USD 30 billion. The government is providing direct cash transfers to the affected people.

These include the disbursement of PKR 25,000 through the Benazir Income Support Program and a Kissan Package of PKR 600 billion,” she said. The standing committee was also apprised that Federal Board of Revenue has missed its targets of Sales Tax and Custom Duty because of import compression (16.9% till the end of October). Income tax targets have, however, been achieved.

The committee was further informed that 2.581 million tax filers have submitted their returns as opposed to 3.6 million filers last time (although time in filing returns is remaining). The committee expressed its concern over the lack of increase in tax filers and taxes being collected from existing filers only. The committee also showed its apprehension regarding the tax regime in flood inundated areas such as Khairpur.

Credit : Independent News Pakistan-WealthPk