Per capita income has declined by 11.38 percent during Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s government, which has also failed to meet all major sectoral targets, JEE News reported on Friday.
In dollar terms, the country’s per capita income has fallen to $1,568 in the outgoing fiscal year 2022-23 from $1,766 in the previous fiscal year.
Government sources confirmed to JEE News that per capita income in dollar terms has declined by more than 11 percent.
The size of the country’s economy of 231.5 million people – as shared by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) – also shrank in dollar terms as it was down from $375 billion in the outgoing fiscal year 2022-23. became 341.6 billion dollars. Last financial year 2021-22
The depreciation of the exchange rate and the decline in real gross domestic product (GDP) growth reduced the size of the economy in dollar terms by $33.4 billion in just one year.
In rupee terms, the size of the economy stood at Rs 38.927 trillion for the outgoing financial year 2022-23 as against Rs 38.814 trillion in the previous financial year 2021-22.
Growth rate confusionÂ
Sources told JEE News that this is the first time in the country’s history that the National Accounts Committee (NAC) held its meeting without presenting any working paper mainly because of haste in calculating the required growth rate. Changes were made to the progress figures and the working paper could not be finalized by the last minute.
Various inconsistencies have now been pointed out which indicate that the synergy could not be developed properly. Education sector growth showed a provisional GDP growth of 10.4 per cent, the highest growth ever posted by one of the neglected sectors – in the last financial year 2017-18. was 3.7 percent.
The health services sector grew by 8.5 percent, higher than the 6.2 percent posted during the COVID-19 pandemic when it was the main focus of the government and its resources to effectively combat it. was turned aside.
Other services are higher than last year, which is unusual, as most of this growth rate is fixed for the base year. How can a small component of a variable spin a growth number?
A negative growth of 3.2 percent in major agricultural crops, a negative growth of 7.9 percent in large scale manufacturing and a negative growth of 4.46 percent in wholesale and trade was observed despite a large decline in imports.
The services sector, which contributes 58 percent of the country’s growth, has reportedly witnessed major inconsistencies, with growth numbers moving from negative to positive.
Another anomaly has emerged, as the government claimed to donors that 1.8 million animals were killed in severe floods but the livestock sector saw a 3.78 percent increase.
The timings of the NAC meeting were changed four times on Wednesday. Initially, the top brass of PBS resisted but a meeting was called at the Q Block (Ministry of Finance) where two senior officials told the concerned constituencies that the growth numbers should be positive.
The GDP growth rate was brought down to 6.1% from 6.5% for the last fiscal year and then services and others were increased for the current fiscal year to take it from the negative zone to positive for the current fiscal year. Can be taken to the limit. . As all this was in the background, the working paper could not be presented in the NAC meeting.
Data released by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) showed that growth should hover around a positive 0.5 percent of GDP according to their model, but when actual numbers were run through it, Contradictions emerged.
Sources said Finance Minister Ishaq Dar did not play any role in hacking the GDP growth rate data as he did not attend any of these official meetings.
