Ayesha Mudassar

Pakistan has been facing an array of challenges, including lower productivity, lack of investment in human development and complex regulatory procedures, marring investment and economic growth.This was highlighted by Chief Executive Officer of National Productivity Organisation (NPO) Muhammad Alamgir Chaudhry while talking to WealthPK.

He said that the country was witnessing low productivity mainly due to unskilled workforce, a lack of technological advancement, a low level of global integration, and complex regulatory procedures. “Given the various reasons for the low productivity, there is a need to adopt a set of prudent measures, including encouraging innovation, enhancing trade openness and streamlining regulations, to improve productivity,” he underscored.

Meanwhile, talking to WealthPK, Dr Mahmood Khalid, a senior research economist at the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics (PIDE), said Pakistan was also facing a significant challenge of low investment in human development. “Development of human resources is not encouraging in Pakistan. The knowledge produced and the knowledge needed is hugely different.”

According to UNDP Global Human Development Report 2021-22, Pakistan has slipped from the 154th position in 2020 to the 161st position in 2021. “Through augmenting the process of human development, productive abilities of the workforce could be enhanced, leading to economic expansion,” the PIDE research economist stressed.

The ever-widening fiscal deficit is also a big hurdle to the country’s robust economic development as the government is unable to curtail its expenditure and generate enough revenues to be spent on development projects. According to the statistics released by the ministry of finance, Pakistan’s fiscal deficit has been recorded at Rs1,683 billion during the first six months of the fiscal year 2022-23.

The country’s policymakers will have to strictly follow the fiscal discipline and finance all the additional expenditures through taxes rather than through borrowing at high interest rates. The country is also facing heavy external and domestic indebtedness, massive outflow of money, rising poverty, unemployment and heightened inflation.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan-WealthPk