Gross Domestic Product

The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at market prices for the year 2009-10 was PKR 14,668.43 billion as compared to PKR 12,739.34 billion in 2009.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

The Gross National Product at market price was PKR 15,239.04 billion in 2010 whereas in 2009 it was PKR 13,083.83 billion.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

GDP contribution by sector, 2010:

• Agriculture: 21.79%
• Industrial: 23.62%
• Service: 54.59%

(Source: econstats)

The GDP per capita at current prices was PKR 77,785.91 in 2009 which increased from PKR 63,631.72 which was in 2008. (Source: IMF)

The per capita income in 2010 was PKR 91,515 which increased from PKR 79,896 in 2009. (Source: National Statistics)

The GNI per capita PPP was USD 2,678 in 2010. (Source: UNDP)

Income tax

Income tax on Individual incomes in Pakistan is taxed progressively from 0.50% to 20%.

(Source: taxrate.cc)

Corporate tax

The corporate tax rate in Pakistan is 35% of net taxable income.

(Source: taxrate.cc)

Inflation Rate

Pakistan rate in Pakistan increased in FY10 was recorded at 11.7% as compared to 20.8% in 2009.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

FDI Inflow

Total Foreign Direct Investment in FY 2011 (till February) was USD 989.6 million and for FY 2010 was USD 2,150.8 million.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Portfolio Investment

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Banking sector assets

The total assets of State Bank of Pakistan were PKR 1,377,394.9 million which increased from PKR 1,223,717.6 million in 2009.

The table below displays the assets of the State Bank of Pakistan.

(Currency Unit: PKR ‘000)

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Consumer Price Index

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Base year 2000-01 = 100

The consumer price index in Pakistan has increased to 159 in 2009 from 140 in 2008, which indicates that the prices of consumer goods have been increasing.

Interest rates on saving deposits / time deposits

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Money supply (Currency in Circulation)

According to the State Bank of Pakistan, currency in circulation at the end of June 2010 was PKR 1,295,385 million.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Government Expenditure

Government expenditures in Pakistan increased in 2010 to PKR 2,577 billion to reach PKR 2,101.4 billion in 2009.

 (Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

External Debt and Domestic Debt

Total debt as the percentage of GDP decreased from 66% of 2009 to 65.2% in 2010.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Official exchange rate

PKR per USD rate for the year 2010 was registered at 83.8. The Pakistani rupee per USD has increased from 59.86 in 2006 to 83.8 in 2010.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Government Financial well-being

Fiscal balance

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Fiscal deficit for 2010 was PKR 525.1 billion which increased from 2009 where it was PKR 422.1 billion.

Total Revenue

The country's revenue in 2010 was recorded at PKR 2,051.9 billion, which increased from PKR 1,679.3 billion.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Tax revenue

Tax revenues in Pakistan in 2010 were PKR 1,483 billion or 10.1% of the GDP.

(Source: Ministry of Finance)

Current Account Balance - Surplus/Deficit

Pakistan has registered current account deficit for the past many years. The current account deficit in 2008 was -8.47% of the GDP after which the deficit was reduced to -5.71% in 2009 and further to -2% in 2010.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Balance of Payments

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

The labour force in Pakistan was recorded at 53.72 million people in 2009. Female and male labour force was recorded at 11.81 million and 41.91 million respectively.

The labour force participation rate in 2008-09 survey was 32.8% of the total population. The participation rate for males and females were 49.6% and 14.9% respectively.

There is high prevalence of child labour in Pakistan which is the result of increasing number of people living below the poverty line.

Of the total labour force, 50.79 million were employed and 2.93 million were unemployed

Employed labour force by sectors (%) for the year 2008-09:

• Agriculture – 45.1%
• Manufacturing – 13.0%
• Construction – 6.6%
• Transport – 5.2%
• Services – 13.66%
• Others – 0.10%

(Source: Ministry of Finance)

Unemployment rate

The unemployment rate in 2009 was 5.5% which increased from 5.2% which was in 2008.

(Source: Ministry of Finance)

(Source: Ministry of Finance)

Minimum wage

The government announced a new labour policy in 2010, under which the minimum wage was increased by 16% from PKR 6,000 per month to PKR 7,000 per month.

(Source: Ministry of Finance)

Level of unionisation

The freedom of association is denied to workers in many sectors. The activities of trade unions are also affected by the requirement that any gathering of more than four people is subject to police authorisation. The government also has the right to prohibit any strike if it lasts for more than 30 days.

The strikes are often shorter in nature and broken by police. Employers use strikes as a reason for the dismissal of workers or are ended by the arrests and dismissal of union leaders.

Major trade unions in Pakistan include:

• All Pakistan Trade Union Congress (APTUC)
• Pakistan Workers' Federation (PWF)

PWF is the largest trade union centre in Pakistan with an affiliation of 419 unions and a membership of over 880,000 workers.

(Source: ituc, ICFTU)

Pakistan has a Parliamentary democracy system of government. The president is the head of state and the prime minister is the head of the government.

The country has a bicameral parliament which consists of 100 seat senate and a 342 seat national assembly.

The political parties’ active in Pakistan includes:

• Pakistan People's Party (PPP)
• Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N)
• Awami National Party (ANP)
• Pakistan Muslim League (PML)
• Muttahid Majlis-e-Amal (umbrella group) (MMA)
• Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM)

The disputed territory of Kashmir has been the reason for three wars between Pakistan and India, the last one in 1999. The country’s political stability has been affected by periods of military rule along with corruption and confrontations between various organisations.

Pakistan was under military rule towards the end of 1999 when General Pervez Musharraf staged a coup, overthrowing the democratic government led by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. In 2001, Musharraf named himself president. Musharraf resigned as President in 2008 because of the charges of impeachment against him. After this, a new government led by Asif Ali Zardari as the President and Yousef Raza Gilani as Prime minister was formed.

(Source: state.gov, BBC)

Regulatory environment in Pakistan

(Source:Heritage.org)

The country’s economic freedom score is 55.1 making its economy the 123^rd freest in the 2011 Index of Economic Freedom. Pakistan ranks 24^th out of 41 regional countries in the Asia–Pacific region. The country’s overall score is lower than the global and regional averages.

Corruption perception

The Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) is a survey to measure the perceived level of corruption across countries worldwide. Pakistan is ranked 143^rd on this list which indicates that the corruption levels in the public departments in the country is fairly high.

(Source:transparency.org)

Freedom of information

Media in Pakistan is restricted. Constitutional and legal powers are used by the government to curb the freedom of media. (Source: BBC)

World Press Freedom Index 2010 ranks Pakistan at 151^st rank with a score of 56.17 which indicates that media in Pakistan is restricted. (Source: rsf.org)

Newspapers

• Daily Jang
• Dawn
  
• The Nation
• The Frontier Post
• The News
• Daily Ausaf
• Daily Times

(Source: BBC)

Judicial system

The court system in Pakistan:

• Supreme Court
• Provincial high courts
• Federal Islamic (or Shariat) Court
• Subordinate courts
• Special Courts and Tribunals

Supreme Court is the Apex Court and also the court of final appeal and the final arbiter of law and constitution. The Supreme Court also hears civil and criminal appeals from high courts and the Federal Shariat Court.

There are high courts in each province and a high court for Islamabad Capital Territory.

The Federal Islamic (or Shariat) Court consists of the Chief Justice and seven other Muslim judges. The judges are appointed through Judicial Commission which includes the Chief Justice of Pakistan as Chairperson, four senior judges of the Supreme Court, one former Chief Justice or a retired judge of the Supreme Court appointed by the Chairperson in consultation with the four member judges for a period of two years.

The subordinate courts are divided into:

• Civil courts
• Criminal courts

There are also other courts and tribunals for civil and criminal cases. The High Court supervises the administration of these courts.

Special Courts and Tribunals – These courts are under the supervision of the Federal Government. They function under various ministries/ departments of the government. These include:

• Special Courts (Control of Narcotics Substances)
• Banking Courts (Recovery Loans)
• Special Courts (Offences in Banks)
• Special Courts (Customs, Taxation & Anti-Smuggling)
• Income Tax Appellate Tribunal
• Environment Appellate Tribunal
• Insurance Appellate Tribunal
• Customs, Excise & Sales Tax Appellate Tribunal
• Special Judges (Central)
• Drugs Courts
• Anti- Terrorism Courts
• Accountability Courts

(Source: supremecourt.gov.pk)

The total population of Pakistan for the year 2010 was 173.51 million, increasing at a rate of about 2.1% over the previous year.

(Source: Ministry of Finance)

The gender ratio in the country is imbalanced i.e. there are about 106.2 males for every 100 females in the country.

(Source: UN)

The mortality rate of infants (per 1,000 live births) was registered at 63.9 for the period 2005-2010.

The crude death rate in 2010 was recorded at 7.4 deaths (per 1,000) and crude birth rate was 28 (per 1,000).

The average life expectancy in 2010 was 64.5 years. The average life expectancy for males was 63.6 years and for females was 65.4 years (2010).

(Source: Ministry of Finance)

Population below 14 years of age in the country is 36.9% of the total population (for the year 2009). In 2009, 6.2% women and 6.1% men (% of total population) were aged above 60 years. The median age of the total population was 21.3 years.

International migrant stock till mid 2010 was recorded at 4.2 million people. This was approximately 2.3% of the entire population.

(Source: UN)

The latest figures reveal that urban population in the country was 63.05 million and grew at an annual rate of 3.0% between 2005 and 2010. For the same period, the rural population was 110.46 million and grew at a slower rate of 1.2% per year.

(Source: Ministry of Finance, UN)

Ethnic groups in Pakistan include:

• Punjabi
• Sindhi
• Pashtun
• Baloch
• Muhajir
• Saraiki
• Hazara

(Source: state.gov)

The country ranks 125^th out of 169 countries on the Human Development index 2010 conducted by the United Nations. The HDI provides a composite measure of three dimensions of human development: living a long and healthy life (measured by life expectancy), being educated (measured by adult literacy and gross enrolment in education) and having a decent standard of living (measured by purchasing power parity, PPP, income).

(Source: UNDP)

Education

The education system is not well developed and the government has not done enough to improve the education infrastructure and is one of the neglected sectors. The participation and enrolment rates are lower as compared to other Asian countries. In Pakistan with respect to education there are wide disparities among male-female, inter-regional and rural-urban class.

In the country, about 22% of females completed their primary schooling as compared to 47% males. Only 30 percent of children receive secondary education.

(Source: World Bank)

The government expenditure on education was just 2.0% of the total GNP.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

The country’s literacy rate for the year 2009 was at 57%.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

Health care

The expenditure on health care sector was 0.5% of the GNP.

(Source: State Bank of Pakistan)

As of 2007 there were 107,853 doctors in Pakistan, 19,623 were specialists, and 7,446 were dentists. The population per doctor was 1,475 and population per dentist was 21,362 and population per nurse was 3,644.

For the same period, total health facilities were 13,937 and total hospitals were 965. Total beds in hospitals and dispensaries were 105,005. Population per bed was 1,515 and population to health care facility ratio was 11,413.

(Source: Ministry of Health)

The public transport system in Pakistan is in a developmental stage. The mass public transport in the country is dependent on roads and railways.

The railway service in Pakistan is under state administration. At the end of 2009-10, the total length of railway tracks in the country is 11,713 km whereas the total route length was 7,791 km.

As of 2007, the total road network was 259,758 km of which National Highway and Motorways accounted for 10,525 km. About 63% of the country’s roads are paved. The roadways account for 91% of the country’s passenger traffic.

(Source: Pakistan Railways, World Bank)

Ports

Pakistan has three ports which are Port of Gwadar, Port of Karachi and Port Muhammad Bin Qasim. Port of Karachi and Port Muhammad Bin Qasim handle 95% of the country’s international trade.

Source: (world port source)

Airports

The country has about 36 international airports in the country. Few of the major airports are:

(Source: Air charter world)

Telecommunications networks

In 2010, 18.5 million people or 10.4% of the total population used internet services in the country.

(Source: internetworldstats.com)