Descent into chaos: Evolution from an economic state to a security state

It’s not about how much the Pakistan government spends but where it spends.

Sustainable Reform

Economic policy management covers a large area encompassing several sectors and sub-section. An important area of macroeconomic management is monetary policy and the issue of discount rate and banking spread that impacts the cost of production. Another critical area is that of economic governance and law and order.

There are a host of procedural issues that industrialists and industrial managers face on a day to day basis and which impacts on manufacturing development. The working paper, “Proposed Agenda for Sustained Economic Revival” written by Dr Kaiser Bengali looks at various aspects of macroeconomic policy, considered more critical for economic revival, and argues for priority attention to these aspects.

The paper proposes reforms in the fiscal and import structures of the economy, with the aim of resolving the underlying severity of budget and current account deficits.

The paper considers plugging the rupee and dollar gaps as crucial for sustained economic recovery and, in this respect, pleads for stopping haemorrhaging of foreign exchange and for expansion of the industrial base and creating a sustained basis for employment growth.

Dr Bengali is a former Managing Director of the Social Policy and Development Centre and currently a Consultant. He has also served as Adviser to Chief Minister Sindh for Planning and Development.

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There is an air of optimism since the change of government but the fact remains that Pakistan faces grim economic prospects and short-term measures will not do the trick. Damage that has been done over a period of decades cannot be undone in just a few years.

So far, what the governments have been doing is treat the symptoms and not the cause and no single regime can be held responsible for this state of affairs, but there is no doubt, that there needs to be a unified effort to turn things around.

The measures that need to be taken are not just economic in nature. Supremacy of the Constitution, an independent Judiciary and continuity of democracy are all elements that need to be promoted and upheld to pave the way towards a stable environment, which will then encourage economic growth. This cannot be done until the political setup which will have to include all political parties, the bureaucracy and the agricultural and industrial leadership develop a consensus on the way forward.



How we got here

However, this time around, we need to treat the disease, and not just the symptoms, we need to diagnose how we got here, isolate the root causes and eventually, find possible solutions.

One of the primary transformations that Pakistan has undergone since the 1970s is the shift from a production based to consumption based economy. This is primarily why in our case a drop in imports signals a drop in industrial output, in retail sales and in tax generation, as a result.



Today almost 85% of the GDP is generated by consumption, a situation that was different prior to the 1980s. One way that the report “Agenda for Sustained Economic Revival” looks at this and comes to this conclusion is by looking at the numbers for energy consumption. According to the report, until about 1990, industrial consumption exceeded domestic consumption but went through a gradual reversal after that. Now domestic power consumption is rising at a faster pace than industrial power consumption.

Source: Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources

One of the primary reasons given for this was when the focus of the government shifted. Up to the 70s, the main focus had been on industrial growth, agricultural revolution and economic development.

However, the regional paradigm shifted post 1977 and since then Pakistan has become a security state.

Once again, the report looks at a set of numbers and quotes defence spending to back this up. For example, according to data the growth of economic and development spending in the 70s was 21% per year while defence expenditure was growing at about two percent. In the 1980s development spending nose-dived to an annual increase of three percent while defence spending jumped to nine percent.

Saying that Pakistan has slipped from being an economic state to a security state is an opinion that can be challenged but the numbers that indicate this shift are irrefutable. And this is a result of the shift in the approach to economic management over the last three decades.

The trend shifted from accumulation of assets in the development period, including but not limited to the construction of dams, canals, motorways, power plants and, industrial zones and factories. And this growth was led by the public sector and complemented by the private sector. Whether one agrees with or supports the regimes in place, or not, it is an undeniable fact that Pakistan underwent an industrial and agricultural revolution in the 60s and 70s.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 16^th,  2013.

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