Govt Has No Plans to Spend Money on New Mega Projects: Report

Public Sector Development Program (PSDP) will not get any additional share in funds for the next two fiscal years. Its size of share will remain the same as the current year’s Rs. 675 billion. It implies that no mega projects will be initiated in the coming years. This has been revealed by a top official of the Ministry of Planning.

The current allocation for the development expenditure in the new budget deviates from the projected federal development spending in the proposed five-year plan (2018-23).

The MoP intends to expend Rs. 1 trillion under the PSDP every year for the next five years to meet its targets. Nevertheless, Planning Secretary, Zafar Hasan, excluded the possibility of restoring the projects ruled out by the current government to reduce the overall size of the PSDP.

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The planning ministry also apprised the standing committee on the proposed 12^th five-year economic plan. It said the provinces are bound to follow the proposed plan. While answering a question, the planning secretary told that the Finance Ministry has not officially shared the PSDP size for the year 2019-20.

However, the ongoing discussions suggest that the size will remain almost the same as this year’s level. The government has even reduced the current year’s size of PSDP to Rs. 675 billion to narrow down the budget deficit.

With respect to the size of the economy, the finance ministry has kept the PSDP allocation at 3.5 percent of GDP, which is the same as the current year’s allocation.