According to figures released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics on Thursday, Pakistan’s exports of services registered a 90pc growth on a year-on-year basis to $668.33m till February. It could help the government in addressing the ballooning current account deficit in 2016-17.
In the first eight months of the current financial year, exports of services have registered a negative growth. They declined 2.98pc to $3.52 billion in July-Feb. The annual drop was 7.14pc to $5.46bn in 2015-16.
The main engine of economic growth has been the services sector. It saw its share increasing from 56pc of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 2005-06 to 57.7pc in 2014-15. Its major sub-categories are finance and insurance, transport and storage, wholesale and retail trade, public administration and defence.
Pakistan has unlocked its market to foreign service providers, particularly in banking, insurance, telecommunications and retail sectors. Services’ imports rose by 1.35pc to $5.51bn in July-Feb. On a monthly basis, the increase averaged to around 15.45pc in February when services’ imports amounted to $650.92m. They declined 10.96pc to $7.87bn in 2015-16 against $8.843bn of services imports in the preceding year. Among the services whose imports declined included transportation, travel, communications, insurance, financial, computer and information services.
The trade deficit in services increased 10.09pc to $1.98bn in July-Feb on a year-on-year basis.
