Pakistan exports grow to $2.3b in March

Pakistan exports have registered a growth of $2.3 billion in March this year, an increase of 13.4 per cent over February, a monthly highest in the last decade.

This was announced by Adviser to the Prime Minister on Commerce and Investment, Abdul Razak Dawood, on Twitter Thursday.

“Ministry of Commerce is glad to share that according to provisional figures, in March 2021 our exports increased to $2.345 billion. This is an increase of 13.4 per cent over Feb-2021. It is the monthly highest in last ten years,” he said in a series of tweets.

Razak pointed out this is also the first time since 2011 that exports have crossed the $2 billion mark for six consecutive months. “The export growth of 29.3% over March 2020 should not be considered as it is misleading since there was a lockdown last year,” he cleared.

He said imports grew to $5.3 billion in March mainly due to increased imports of petroleum, wheat, soy bean, machinery, raw material and chemicals, mobiles, fertilizers, tyres and antibiotics and vaccines.

For the 9-month period of July-March of the current financial year (FY), the adviser said exports increased by 7% to $18.669 billion as compared to $17.451 billion in the corresponding period last year.

During the same period, imports grew by 12% to $39.210 billion this FY as compared to $34.817 billion in the last FY. “This growth has come from increase in import of raw material as well as import of wheat, sugar and cotton,” he explained.

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