ISLAMABAD: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) Executive Board has issued a schedule for meetings up until June 29 but Pakistan is not on the agenda as the release of pending bailout funds under a 9th review hangs in the balance.
A staff-level agreement to release $1.1 billion of a $6.5 billion package agreed in 2019 has been delayed since November, with more than 100 days gone since the last staff-level mission to Pakistan, the longest such delay since at least 2008. The program expires on June 30, 2023, with around $2.6 billion undisbursed.
Pakistan has barely enough currency reserves to cover one month’s imports. It had hoped to have $1.1 billion of the funds released in November — but the IMF has insisted on a number of conditions before it makes any more disbursements.
Pakistan only has time for one last IMF board review before the end of the $6.5 billion Extended Fund Facility (EFF).
“We are still very hopeful that the IMF program will materialize. Our 9th review by the IMF will match all terms and conditions and, hopefully, we’ll have some good news this month,” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said earlier this month, adding that Pakistan had completed all prior actions needed to unlock funding.
According to the IMF Executive Board calendar available on its website, the next meetings are scheduled for 20, 21, 22, 26, 27, and 28 of this month and then again on June 29, 2023. However, Pakistan is not on the agenda though it could be added in the event that the ninth review is declared a success.
As per the IMF Staff report, “Pakistan: Seventh, and Eighth Reviews of the extended arrangement,” the proposed schedule for the ninth review was November 3, 2022, which was delayed due to the failure of the government to implement agreed time-bound conditions and structural benchmarks.
The tenth review’s schedule as per the seventh/eighth review documents was February 3, 2023, but the ninth review is yet to be completed.
