Minister Aurangzeb holds series of meetings in US

ISLAMABAD: Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb participated in a number of high-level meetings on the sidelines of the World Bank-IMF Annual Meetings in Washington on Wednesday.

A Pakistani delegation of senior officials led by Aurangzeb is attending the WB-IMF Annual Meetings, which is taking place from October 21 to 26.

State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) Governor Jameel Ahmad, Secretary of Economic Affairs Dr. Kazim Niaz, and Finance Secretary Imdad Ullah Bosal are among the other members of the delegation.

In the meeting with Assistant Secretary of State for Economic and Business Affairs, US Department of State, Amy Holman, the finance czar acknowledged the importance of Pak-US economic partnership in Pakistan's socio-economic development and thanked the US for its support.

He highlighted the investment potential in agriculture, IT, energy, mines and minerals sectors, and invited US enterprises to invest in these areas.

Separately, the finance minister held a meeting with the delegation of Islamic Trade Finance Corporation (ITFC), led by its CEO Eng Hani Salem Sonbol.

He appreciated the support from the ITFC for commodity financing of $3 billion through a Framework Agreement over the next three years and immediate provision of $269 million through a mix of direct financing and syndication.

Meanwhile, the ITFC expressed its resolve to diversify its portfolio in Pakistan. While, the finance minister assured full support of the government in this regard.

In a meeting with the team of Deutsche Bank, the finance minister briefed about the state of Pakistan’s economy.

During the meeting, satisfaction was expressed on upgradation of Pakistan's credit ratings by Fitch and Moody’s.

The Pakistani dignitary informed the forum that a Sustainable Finance Framework (SFF) was being developed by the government which would enable the country to access the green international capital.

The finance minister also met with the team of FitchRatings and appreciated that Pakistan’s credit ratings had been upgraded by Fitch from CCC to CCC+.

He briefed the team about the performance of the Pakistan's economy. The measures being undertaken for revenue mobilisation, expenditure rationalisation, tariff reduction in the energy sector and an accelerated privatisation programme too were highlighted in the forum.

The finance czar expressed satisfaction that government had sufficient reserves to repay the external debt liabilities for the current year.

On the other hand, Aurangzeb attended the roundtable organised by the Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action.

He participated in the group discussion on 'Designing Tools, Instruments, and Policies to Scale Up Nature Finance'.

The discussion was focused on the lessons and best practices on the implementation of finance-related targets in the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) and solutions to close the biodiversity finance gap.

Moreover, the minister gave a talk on Pakistan’s economic outlook at the Wilson Centre in Washington DC. He highlighted the performance of the national economy over the last one year.

He also shed light on major reforms including increase in tax-to-GDP ratio through broadening the tax base, expenditure control through subsidy rationalisation, reforms in the energy sector, SoE governance reforms, providing a level playing field to businesses and building climate resilience.

The FinMin Aurangzeb held a meeting with the team of an international private bank working in Pakistan as well. He appreciated the bank’s longstanding partnership with the country and informed its delegation that government was constantly engaged with rating agencies.

The two sides discussed various proposals including trade financing facility, syndicated facility and explored further partnership in climate financing including carbon credits, green bonds and debt swaps.