IMF must be more active on debt restructurings, Georgieva says
Georgieva told an event hosted by the Bretton Woods Committee booster group that African countries and others, in a 1-1/2-hour meeting, said they wanted the IMF to provide more technical assistance to countries grappling with high debt levels.
She said the Global Sovereign Debt Roundtable, which includes creditor and borrowing countries as well as the IMF and the World Bank, had separately approved a new playbook to help countries navigate the complex process of restructuring heavy debt burdens.
The roundtable will release the document after a closed-door meeting in Washington on Wednesday during the spring meetings of the IMF and the World Bank.
A joint statement released by Georgieva and Hervé Ndoba, chair of the African Caucus and Central African Republic's minister of finance and budget, said Africa faces the risk of further shocks that could undo strong policy actions taken to bring down inflation, stabilize public debt and reduce external imbalances.
'While growth in Africa is showing some resilience in the face of multiple shocks, the sudden shift in the global outlook has interrupted the growth momentum,' the two leaders said, noting that growth on the African continent had been revised down by 0.3 percentage point to 3.9% for 2025.
Pakistan reiterates pledge to IMF on economic reforms
African leaders and the IMF agreed on the need to ensure macroeconomic and financial stability while working to meet the continent's economic development goals.
They said domestic reform efforts should promote fiscal sustainability by boosting revenue and improving spending efficiency.
'Now, more than ever, the Fund is committed to working with its member countries to help navigate the complex global economic environment,' the joint statement said, noting that addition of a 25th chair on the Executive Board for sub-Saharan Africa strengthened the region's voice in the fund.
The statement also pledged that the IMF would 'remain agile' in responding to emerging challenges, and providing support to initiatives like the G20 Common Framework and the Global Sovereign Debt Roundtable.
It welcomed IMF steps to review both its debt sustainability framework for low-income countries and the design and conditionality of lending programs with an eye to addressing macroeconomic imbalances and promoting growth.
The African Consultative Group includes governors from 12 African countries belonging to the African Caucus and IMF management.
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Express Tribune
a day ago
- Express Tribune
PSDP spending revised to Rs1.05tr
Listen to article Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal announced on Thursday that actual federal development spending surged to a record Rs1.05 trillion in the last fiscal year due to booking more external development loans and eleventh-hour releases by budget controllers. The development marked an anticlimax for the planning ministry's efforts to fully utilise the revised allocation of Rs1.1 trillion and the finance ministry's tactics to slow fund releases, including partially shutting down systems by the Accountant General of Pakistan Revenue (AGPR). For the first time in Pakistan's history, the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) spending rose to Rs1.046 trillion in fiscal year 2024-25, said Ahsan Iqbal while addressing a press conference. Last week, the planning minister had confirmed to The Express Tribune that the PSDP spending remained at Rs905 billion due to slower releases by the AGPR office. After the close of fiscal year on June 30, the finance ministry provisionally assessed that it had managed to achieve the primary budget surplus target agreed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). A planning ministry's report showed that it booked spending of another Rs141 billion from July 2 to 9, which pushed total expenses to Rs1.046 trillion. In yet another record, the government showed spending of Rs449 billion, or 43% of the total, in June alone. The planning minister said that the addition of Rs141 billion in one week was because of booking Rs80 billion in more foreign loans and further releases by the AGPR. After this, the total foreign loans for the PSDP increased to Rs237.4 billion. The planning ministry official said that the AGPR had shut the system used to book the spending claims. He said that the system was shut down to make sure that the IMF's primary budget surplus target was achieved. He added that on the intervention of the PM Office, the system was opened and more funds were released. To a question, PIDE University Vice Chancellor Dr Nadeem Javaid said that by limiting development spending to Rs905 billion, the finance ministry was trying to show an overall budget deficit at 5.6% of GDP against the target of 5.9%. He said that the higher spending of Rs1.046 trillion would not impact the primary budget surplus target. The planning minister said that one of the reasons behind booking massive spending in June was the wrong budget strategy, which had an "in-built bias" against utilisation by linking 40% of PSDP spending with the last quarter of the fiscal year. The Ministry of Finance on Wednesday released the development budget strategy for fiscal year 2025-26, which again highlighted the release of 40% budget in the last quarter. Funds for the development budget shall be authorised by the Planning, Development & Special Initiatives Division out of the PSDP allocation for FY26 for approved projects at 15% for Q1, 20% for Q2, 25% for Q3 and 40% for Q4, according to the finance ministry. "Notwithstanding anything contained in this strategy, all releases shall be subject to availability of fiscal space," stated the strategy, which again put a question mark over whether the Rs1 trillion budget for the new fiscal year would be given or not. Ahsan Iqbal said that the planning ministry would take up the matter with the finance ministry and would urge it to equally distribute funds instead of 40% spending in the last quarter. The back-end fund releases create artificial budget surpluses in the first three quarters, which evaporate in the last quarter. The minister said that the additional expenses of Rs141 billion helped create fiscal space for projects in this fiscal year. He said that the water sector's entire allocation of Rs194 billion was utilised because of eleventh-hour releases. Likewise, Suparco, the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission and the power ministry also fully utilised their development budgets. Planning Commission Chief Economist Dr Imtiaz Ahmad also released the monthly development update for June. The report showed that last month 33 projects worth Rs90.4 billion were approved and 19 projects totaling Rs1.4 trillion were recommended to Ecnec. Major investments were targeted in the energy sector, where over Rs500 billion worth of projects were approved, followed by Rs395 billion worth of Hyderabad-Sukkur Motorway Eastbay Expressway costing Rs301 billion. These initiatives are expected to generate 9,986 direct and 47,174 indirect jobs, according to the report. As a direct outcome of these initiatives, 5,074 formal posts will be established immediately during the project execution period. According to the provisional figures, the government spent Rs63.6 billion on parliamentarians' schemes in the last fiscal year. The spending was more than the downward-revised budget. But Iqbal said that after initially deciding to revise the budget downwards, the government decided to retain the original allocation of Rs75 billion for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) programme. The parliamentarians' schemes are branded as SDG initiatives. Another Rs82 billion was spent on provincial projects, which are funded by the federal government. A week ago, the provincial spending was shown at Rs69 billion. The financing of provincial schemes is against the commitments given to the IMF and the National Fiscal Pact. About Rs70 billion was spent on schemes being executed in the erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Areas, now merged with Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Spending on higher education remained at Rs59.6 billion. The Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission received its full budget of Rs25 billion, but for this fiscal year, the government has drastically cut its allocation. Development spending by the Space & Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (Suparco) remained at Rs41 billion. The government spent Rs194 billion on projects of the Ministry of Water Resources, Rs40 billion more than shown a week ago. For this fiscal year, the government has reduced the water sector allocation by 28%.
Express Tribune
a day ago
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Pak eyes $1b valuation for Roosevelt
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Business Recorder
a day ago
- Business Recorder
Forex reserves cross $20bn mark after three years
KARACHI: In a major development to the country's external account, Pakistan's total liquid foreign exchange reserves have surged past the $20 billion mark for the first time in three years, driven by strong foreign inflows. According to the weekly report issued by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Thursday, the country's total liquid foreign exchange reserves increased by $1.94 billion during the previous week. Pakistan's total liquid reserves stood at $20.029 billion as of July 4, 2025, up from $18.09 billion on June 27, 2025. This marks the first time in over three years that reserves have crossed the $20 billion threshold. Previously, Pakistan's foreign exchange reserves were recorded at $21.439 billion on March 18, 2022, but saw a sharp decline to $18.55 billion just a week later, on March 25, 2022. Since then, reserves had remained below the $20 billion level. However, with the receipt of healthy foreign inflows, the country's total liquid reserves, including those held by the SBP and scheduled banks, have once again surpassed the $20 billion mark in the first week of July 2025. During the week under review, SBP's foreign exchange reserves increased by $ 1.774 billion due to receipt of official inflows from international financial institutions. With current surged, the reserves held by the SBP reached $14.502 billion level as of July 4, 2025 compared to $12.729 billion as of June 27, 2025. In addition, net foreign reserves held by commercial banks also witnessed an upward trend and increased by $163.2 million to reach the $5.526 billion mark a week earlier. Overall, the SBP foreign exchange reserves rose by $5.12 billion to $14.51 billion by the end of the last fiscal year (FY25), surpassing the IMF's target of $13.9 billion. This increase aligned with the projection made by SBP Governor Jameel Ahmad, who had stated in January that despite significant external debt repayments, the central bank's reserves would exceed the $14 billion mark by the close of FY25. Before closing the last fiscal year, SBP also received $3.1 billion in commercial loans on behalf of the Government of Pakistan, along with over $500 million in multilateral funding, significantly boosting the country's foreign exchange reserves at three-year peak level. Economists said that overall Pakistan's external account has performed well with support of higher remittances and massive increase in the foreign exchange reserves. Pakistan has also successfully managed the external debt servicing during the last fiscal year but also managed to boost the foreign reserves. Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
