World’s Biggest Economies: Pakistan eyes 11th spot, says Dar

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Finance Ishaq Dar on Saturday hoped that the country’s economy would soon become 11th biggest economy of the world as the government was taking effective measures to align it. In a TV interview he said that international economic rating agencies were expressing positive outlook of Pakistan. Dar said the PML-N government had inherited $9 billion loan from previous regimes, adding that the money had to be returned. He was of the view that the government had taken loans from the IMF to pay the installments for saving the country from becoming a defaulter. He said that Pakistan had Rs2,946 billion till 1999, but in previous regimes it had exceeded to more than Rs12,000 billion. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was committed to putting the country in the right direction, he said and added that the budget was made according to the economic agenda of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 10^th, 2013.