Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb says the Chinese Government has commended Pakistan’s negotiation with the International Monetary Fund and assured to play its role in securing approval from the Fund’s board.

Addressing a news conference in Islamabad today, the Minister said he along with the Minister for Energy Sardar Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari visited China and held constructive meetings with the Chinese authorities including the Finance Minister of China and the President Bank of China.

He informed that during the visit to China re-profiling of energy sector loans was also discussed and the conversion of energy plants to coal and other aspects for affordable energy generation were also discussed.

He informed that China is ranked among the world’s biggest capital markets and Pakistan plans to issue Panda bonds to diversify its funding sources and strengthen its foreign exchange reserves by attracting Chinese investors.

Muhammad Aurangzeb said that Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif had also discussed the local energy requirements with the Chinese top leadership urging them to evolve a mechanism for extending their support to overcome power supply needs of the country.

Regarding the IMF programme, the finance minister further informed that the discussion with the Fund has remained positive and constructive and all the set benchmarks have been achieved.

He said that China, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates have always extended their supports for Pakistan for its economic growth and development. 

The minister said that the incumbent government is also taking several measures on domestic front for turning around the local economy.

He said special emphasis was paid on the taxation side by bringing the non-taxed sectors into the tax net for broadening the tax base.

He said that the government is determined to introduce the same facilities for other sectors to simplify the tax return process.

He said that the expansion of the tax to other sectors like retailers, real estate, builders and developers and agriculture would help to create a space to provide relief and reduce the burden from the existing tax pairs.