There will be a complete ban on purchase of all types of vehicles in Pakistan

Islamabad: Ministry of Finance on Friday issued an Office Memorandum (OM) announcing more austerity measures for financial year 2019-20 with immediate effect. Under the new order:

(i) There will be a complete ban on purchase of all types of vehicles (excluding motorcycles) both for current as well as development expenditure.

(ii) Creation of new posts will be banned except those required for development projects and approved by the competent authority.
(iii) Entitlement of periodical, magazines, newspapers etc. of entitled officers will remain restricted to only one.

(iv) Principal Accounting Officers (PAOs) will ensure rationalised utility consumption i.e. electricity, gas, telephone, water etc and the expenditure on purchase of assets, repair & maintenance and other operational expenditure shall be kept at bare minimum level while remaining within the budgetary allocation for the financial year.

(v) Two sides of paper shall be used in all official communications.

Economic survey of 2018-19 reveled that during first nine month of current fiscal year, EDL recorded an increase of US$ 10.6 billion to stand at US$ 105.8 billion at end-March 2019 out of which public debt was US$ 74.2 billion. External public debt increased by around US$ 3.9 billion during first nine months of current fiscal year compared with the increase of US$ 6.7 billion witnessed during the same period last year. Borrowing from commercial sources (foreign commercial banks and Eurobonds/Sukuks) have relatively increased during the last few years, however, external public debt still largely comprises multilateral and bilateral sources which cumulatively constituted 78 percent of external public debt portfolio at end March 2019. During first nine month of current fiscal year, EDL recorded an increase of US$ 10.6 billion to stand at US$ 105.8 billion at end March 2019 out of which public debt was US$ 74.2 billion. External public debt increased by around US$ 3.9 billion during first nine months of current fiscal year compared with the increase of US$ 6.7 billion witnessed during the same period last year. Borrowing from commercial sources (foreign commercial banks and Eurobonds/Sukuks) have relatively increased during the last few years, however, external public debt still largely comprises multilateral and bilateral sources which cumulatively constituted 78 percent of external public debt portfolio at end March 2019. During first nine month of current fiscal year, EDL recorded an increase of US$ 10.6 billion to stand at US$ 105.8 billion at end March 2019 out of which public debt was US$ 74.2 billion. External public debt increased by around US$ 3.9 billion during first nine months of current fiscal year compared with the increase of US$ 6.7 billion witnessed during the same period last year. Borrowing from commercial sources (foreign commercial banks and Eurobonds/Sukuks) have relatively increased during the last few years, however, external public debt still largely comprises multilateral and bilateral sources which cumulatively constituted 78 percent of external public debt portfolio at end March 2019.

August 25, 2019,