ISLAMABAD-Pakistan will not obtain $375 million loan from the IMF for reconstruction efforts in the quake affected areas, Minister of State for Economic Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar said on Thursday.
“We are not pursuing loan of $375 million being offered by the IMF which itself explains that we have no plan to obtain this facility from the Fund,”Hina Rabbani Khar said while talking to the journalists here on Thursday.
When she was asked about total received loans for earthquake related assistance, she said Pakistan has so far received soft loans worth $614 million out of total $4 billion loan pledges.
During the donors conference held in Islamabad in the aftermath of October 8 earthquake, the donors had pledged $6.6 billion in shape of loans and grants. Out of total $6.6 billion pledges, there are $4 billion pledges in shape of loans and remaining amount is in shape of grants.
The minister said Pakistan has so far successfully negotiated $2.8 billion loan with multilateral and bilateral creditors out of total $4 billion. “It shows the performance of our ministry that we are trying our level best to finalize loans deals,” she added.
She said most of the loans were meant for projects during the reconstruction phase, pouring of money into our kitty would be accelerated in future when reconstruction work would gather pace.
Answering another query, she said all financial institutions are facilitating Pakistan as Islamic Development Bank used to charge 5% interest rates on commercial loans but they are charging only 0.5% on one component of quake related loan. “The IDB is charging 1.5% to 2.8% for quake related loans from Pakistan,” she added.
She said the ADB provided $80 million grants for quake related assistance while WB also provided grant assistance, both these institutions are not meant to give grants to any country.
To another query about debt to GDP ratio, she said the government is committed to achieve debt to GDP ratio up to 60% by 2010 in accordance with Fiscal Responsibility Law but this goal was achieved during the current fiscal year. The debt to GDP ratio is now below 60% at the moment, she added.
http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/may-2006/26/index8.php
IMF has so many conditions, it better not to have it.

the important part of the news report was at the end. our debt to GDP ratio is dropping which is an excellent thing. right now even countries like France and Germany have trouble keeping their debt to GDP rations inside the 60% limit set by the EU. this is good news.

good...the imf can keep it's money....

Good.

pakistan has enough debt as it is and doesnt need to add too it unessesarily

werent the debts taken off us due to cooperation with US for anti-terrorism conributio n?

No this sword is still on our heads...debts are reschudled to 30 - 50 years long term...but we still have to pay...

debt is at least managel now, back in the pre mushrraf day it was out of control.

some debt was written off and some was paid. Pak will pay some in future. But the good news is that pak is not taking much debt now. (except for earth quake). Lets hope we repay most of the debt fast.

Pakistans foreign debt has been hovering about the $35bn mark for the past 6 years. With GDP increasing and foreign debt remaining stagnant, the debt-GDP ratio figures have been improved.

Few questions.

1)How much debt was written off?

2)How much have we paid back?

3)How much debt are we going to get for earth quake and how is it going to affect this 35 billion dollar figure?

pakistan was also on the verge of bankruptcy. would you believe it, bhutto and sharif almost detroyed pakistans whole economy.



the world pleged US$6.4 billion, only US$2.8 billion has been recived by pakistan as of yet. roughly US$4 billion is in the form of soft loans but it not known if pakistan has accepted the total amount.

We said good bye to IMF in 2004.........and i think its time to "write-off" this name from GoPs dictionary on permanent basis.

These disgusting loan companies have the nerve to put the countries they looted into even bigger debt by offering them loans!

IMF Gone. Good for Pakistan