FinMin promises 'good new' from IMF

ISLAMABAD:

Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb promised good news from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) soon, emphasising that the negotiations with the global lender were in the final stages and he saw no impediment to a successful conclusion of the talks.

Talking to the media persons after addressing a ceremony on the occasion of 'World Day of Glaciers', organised by the Climate Change Ministry at the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) headquarters, the minister claimed significant progress in talks with the IMF on climate funding.

"Negotiations with the IMF are ongoing and there is no major hurdle in the success of these talks," Aurangzeb said in an informal chat with reporters. "Talks with IMF will be completed soon. Pakistan is achieving the goals of economic discipline and we will get good news from IMF soon," he added.

He said that the country needed the support of its development partners and the United Nations to tackle climate change. In this regard, he described the talks with IMF over the past two weeks "positive" and termed them a promising step toward securing he vital funding.

Earlier, the minister told the ceremony that the country suffered a lot because of the devastating super floods of 2022. He added that the government received promises of $10 billion in aid for flood damage rehabilitation projects but the aid could not be utilised because of a lack of viable projects.

"Climate change is an important issue for Pakistan but controlling climate change is the real challenge for us. We could not prepare viable projects, so we could not use the aid. We will have to come up with viable projects for climate financing," he told the audience.

Speaking about the environment, he pointed out that Pakistan was home to more than 3,000 glacial lakes out of which 33 were "extremely dangerous". He warned that more than 7 million people were at risk because of possible glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs).

"There is an urgent need for a comprehensive strategy to tackle climate risks," he said, adding that there was a national climate strategy framework but its implementation had been a big challenge. "A 'Glacier Protection and Resilience Strategy' is being presented for public review."

He said "climate change" and "growing population" were the two major threats to the country. "Low rainfall in the winter is an indication of a major threat," he said, adding that good progress was achieved on the country partnership talks with the World Bank, but "we have to bring useful projects for climate".

At present, he said, environmental degradation and large population were major existential threats to the country's economy. "The government will provide all financial and technical resources so that the economy can move forward," he said.

"The 10-year economic reform programme is being prepared by the government with the support of the World Bank, where environmental challenges will get a more significant place. The World Bank will provide us full support in this regard," he added.

(WITH INPUT FROM APP)