Islamabad: (Right Now News) Pakistan’s development budget has been severely impacted by the stringent conditions of the IMF program. Out of the allocated budget of 1 trillion rupees, only 528 billion rupees have been spent.

In a meeting chaired by Federal Minister for Planning Ahsan Iqbal, the Annual Plan Coordination Committee revealed that the cost of incomplete projects has reached 10 trillion rupees. Meanwhile, investment as a percentage of GDP has been limited to 0.6%.

Ahsan Iqbal stated in the meeting that projects worth 5 trillion rupees are in the PC-1 stages. A total of 10 trillion rupees are required for the completion of all projects.

He clarified that since the fiscal year 2018, there has been a trend of resource shortage for the development budget. However, the increase in provincial development budgets has allowed some projects to continue.

It should be noted that for the upcoming fiscal year, ministries demanded a budget of 3 trillion rupees. Yet, the federal development program remains at the 2018 level of 1 trillion rupees.