ISLAMABAD : Finance ministry on Saturday said that the debt burden on the economy has reached up to 87.2 percent, terming the rise mainly due to the impact of coronavirus on the economy. A spokesman for the ministry said that the debt burden on the economy stood at 86.1 percent in June 2019 and witnessed an improvement of two percent by December 2019 to reach 84 percent. The coronavirus impacted the economy, he said after the debt witnessed a three percent increase from December 2019 to June 2020. We had lowered our expenditure in February 2020 and even tackled the current account deficit before the pandemic hit the country [late in February], the spokesman said adding that the COVID-19 changed the fiscal position since then. Besides, remittances suffering a huge blow owing to coronavirus, the growth rate also sustained a setback due to the pandemic, the finance ministry official said. He said that the government was committed to bring down the percentage of debt burden on the economy. “We are strictly following a financial discipline for this purpose,” the spokesman said.
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