Pakistan seeks $11 billion aid from China, Saudi Arabia to keep IMF bailout programme on track: Report
The Dawn newspaper reported that this information was part of a detailed policy statement issued by caretaker Finance Minister Shamshad Akhtar before the Senate Standing Committee on Finance and Revenue, presided over by Senator Saleem Mandviwalla in Islamabad on Thursday.
She said the government was currently working on an economic revival plan that would be presented to the caretaker prime minister Anwar ul Haq Kakar soon and shared with the Senate Standing Committee on Finance.
She said the caretaker government had a limited scope to undertake deep-rooted structural reforms but promised to deliver on reforms that were part of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme to ensure the disbursement of a USD 700 million loan instalment.
Talks with the IMF would begin by the end of October on this.
The IMF reached a staff-level agreement with Pakistan on a nine-month Stand-by Arrangement (SBA) of about USD 3 billion in June.
The finance minister said it was the government's priority to deliver on the IMF programme to ensure economic stability and continuity.
On the external financing gap, Akhtar said the country's financing needs were still higher, but with the joint efforts of all stakeholders, the government would be able to secure disbursements from the project pipeline and also revive some policy-based financing from multilaterals.
External flows would improve with the USD 700 million flows from the IMF.
For net bilateral financing of USD 11 billion, China and Saudi Arabia had been requested along with a request for a Saudi oil facility, she said.
«To meet the external financing requirements, we are working to secure concessional funding from multilaterals (the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, Islamic
