National economy on growth trajectory after achieving stability: Farrukh

ISLAMABAD, May 27 (APP):Highlighting the present government’s unprecedented achievements on the economic front, Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Farrukh Habib Thursday said the national economy was progressing at rapid pace after getting stability.
Addressing a news conference here at the Parliament House, he said it became possible due to restoration of the complete confidence of the international financial institutions and investors into the project-delivery capacity and planning strategy of the national organizations, which was, in fact, result of Prime Minister Imran Khan’s prudent economic policies.
“It is a welcoming situation that yesterday, we saw the highest trading volume in the [Pakistan] stock exchange, which recorded at one and half billion shares after breaking all the previous records. Today that record was also broken as trading volume of the shares crossed 2 billion [mark],” he maintained.
Adding further, he said the PSX [Pakistan Stock Exchange] recorded business of Rs 28 billion the other day and today it witnessed business activity amounting to Rs 45 billion.
The minister said he also wanted to share a positive development with the nation, adding, the ‘WPADA green bond’ attracted six-fold bids from the international green financing organizations.
He said the final bidding amount would come to the fore after its closing, but as of now an interest of record three billion dollars was shown in the bonds.

Farrukh Habib said the country’s exports surged by 13.5 per cent, remittances crossed
$24 billion, large-scale manufacturing grew by nine percent, and production of sugarcane and wheat increased by 22 per cent and 8.1 per cent, respectively.
He said when the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government came into the power, the per capita income was $1,496 which had now increased to $1,604.
Despite the several challenges faced by the country, the primary balance was in surplus, he noted.
He said the good news continued to pour in the country from the international sphere, mentioning the recent unfreezing of the Pakistan International Airlines’ assets in the Reko Diq case.
The minister said the government had transformed the national economy into an export and production led economy, while the Pakistan Muslim League- Nawaz (PML-N) government made cosmetic arrangements for keeping it on track.
Drawing a comparison, he said the foreign loans witnessed a 56 per cent surge during the
PML-N’s stint (2013-2018) and the external debt surged by 32 per cent during the Pakistan peoples Party’s (PPP) tenure, while the foreign loans, borrowed by the present government constituted 21 per cent of the total loans which was too, taken for debt serving of both the previous regimes’ loans.
He said the work on the China Pakistan Economic Corridor was in progress at the fast pace and Prime Minister Imran Khan is scheduled to visit Rashakai Special Economic Zone (SEZ) on Friday (tomorrow).
The minister said the Faisalabad SEZ was inaugurated by the prime minister last year, where development work could be seen on the ground.
He said during the last 40 years, both the parties the PML-N and PPP remained into the power three times each, but they did nothing, except loot and plunder.
Farrukh said the crime in Sindh province was rampant due to bad governance of the PPP government, adding it swung into the action only after the federal government took necessary measures to maintain law and order there.
He told the media that the Protection of Journalists and Media Professionals Bill had been tabled in the National Assembly whose passage from the Parliament and subsequent, enactment would help ensure all kinds of security to the media community.
It was unfortunate that the PML-N had developed a habit of misleading the nation through distorted facts and figures, he said, adding the PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif just took credit of attaining the atomic capability which was, in fact, the feat of someone else.
He said Nawaz Sharif was put behind the bars against corruption and money laundering cases after the Panama Papers’ leaks surfaced in the world.
Both the PML-N leaders Maryam Safdar and Shehbaz Sharif had their separate ‘PDMs’ (Pakistan Democratic Party), expressing inability to recognize that which one was the ‘real’.
The minister chided PPP Co-chairman Bilawal Bhutto over alleged off-shore assets of his father, and asked him to show some courage and bring back billions of dollars plundered wealth of Asif Ali Zardari to the country from Switzerland and other countries.