M. Akram Fareed, Chief of Employers Federation of Pakistan, Islamabad Chapter, addressing the meeting he said that emergency measures should be taken to control the economic situation of the country.
To lock the rate of dollar for materials for industries, the Prime Minister should pay special attention to this issue and give special instructions to the State Bank of Pakistan to lock the rate of dollars for materials for industries.
Billions of dollars’ worth of materials are lying on the port of industries and people and people are not picking them up. This will make the road material expensive which will increase the cast-off production, and the industries which are already difficult to run will become more difficult and this will create a storm of unemployment, so the government should pay special attention to this and to solve this problem, he further said that the increase in the interest rate by the State Bank should be returned immediately will face difficulties, Chief EFP said that the percentage in Malaysia is 3.5% in Indonesia, 3.7% in China, 4.75% in Bangladesh and 4.9% in India but the interest rate in Pakistan is 15% which is very high.
He said that at such high interest rates, it is not possible for the private sector to take loans from banks to promote business and investment. He said that such a huge increase in the policy interest rate will prove disastrous for the industrial sector and the SME sector because these sectors need cheap loans for growth and expansion, while the huge increase in the interest rate will increase the lending of banks. It has become very expensive.
He urged the government to intervene and persuade the State Bank to withdraw its decision immediately to save the private sector from further problems.
Keeping aside the economic situation of the country, to control the IMF and the dollar, we have to come towards the economy and create a consensus so that the country can be taken out of the current economic crisis.
