Pakistan’s trade deficit shrinks by 14 per cent as imports decline

ISLAMABAD: Owing to practical steps taken by the incumbent government, the trade deficit has dropped by 14 per cent in the first 9 months of PTI’s government rule, ARY News reported on Tuesday.

According to the Statistical department, the trade deficit remained $33.45billion in July-March against $47billion in the same period, last year.

The exports were recorded at $17.21billion during the aforesaid period of the nine month, while the imports after witnessing a decrease by eight per cent were recorded at the level of $40.46billion as compared to $44.32billion, last year.

The Commerce Division said the economy is stabilising due to steps being taken by the government.

Last month, Pakistan’s imports had seen a significant decline of 19 percent, to $4.5 billion in January 2019, according to figures released by the statistics department.

According to the department, Pakistan had imported items worth $5.57 billion in January 2018, while the amount of imports reduced to $2.04 billion in Jan 2019.

The significant decline in imports helped the trade deficit to shrink by 31.73 percent to $2.46 billion in January 2019 as compared with $3.6 billion in the same month of the last year.

While the exports grew by only 4 percent to $2.04 billion during the month under review as compared to $1.96 billion in January 2018.