Minister for Finance and Revenue, Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh has said the incumbent government has decided to curtail its expenditures further to pass on relief to the common man. Talking to a private news channel, the finance minister said the government has already taken austerity measures to control the fiscal deficit. He said that macroeconomic indicators are posting positive growth, which shows that the country’s economy is on an upward trajectory. It is due to prudent policies and initiatives, taken by the government under the leadership of Prime Minister Imran Khan. He said the previous government of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) had left the fragile economy by taking huge foreign loans. Shaikh said that the government has been focusing on improving the real sector growth through the promotion of agriculture, industrial, and services sectors of the economy. He said that realising the importance of sub-sectors of the economy, the government has initiated different programmes including National Agriculture Emergency Programme (NAEP) under which 13 mega projects worth Rs 277 billion are under execution currently. He said that the objective of NAEP is to bring about improvements in water availability, soil conservation, and shrimp fanning, and establishing new agriculture markets. The minister said that the Rs10.964 billion megaproject National Oilseed Enhancement Programme (NOEP) under NAEP was launched to boost the adoption of oilseed crops at a cost of Rs10.964 billion for 5 years.
