ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s minister for finance has said Pakistan and the International Monetary Fund had “more or less” finalized a bailout package, local media reported on Saturday, six months after Islamabad requested financial assistance from the Fund to address its economic challenges.
Wrestling with a ballooning current account deficit, Pakistan sought its 13th IMF bailout package in October. Currently, foreign reserves of $8.5 billion are better than the start of the year, but barely cover two months’ worth of imports.
“During the last two days, we have, more or less, reached an understanding,” Dawn newspaper quoted Asad Umar as saying at a news briefing in Washington on Thursday evening. “In the next day or two, we hope to reach a full agreement.”
He said as a next step, IMF officials would now visit Pakistan in the next few weeks to work out technical details. “But in principle, we have reached an agreement,” Umar added.
The finance minister, who reached Washington on Tuesday evening, left for New York on Friday after two days of talks with the IMF and World Bank officials on the sidelines of the group’s spring meetings. The team of experts that came with him remains behind in Washington to finalize the details of a multi-billion dollar, three-year bailout package.
Talks with the IMF began soon after Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government was appointed last August but a package has been held up by differences over the pace and scale of reforms that Pakistan would be required to undertake.
The IMF has pressed Pakistan to improve tax revenue collection, bolster foreign currency reserves and narrow a current account deficit expected to top 5 percent of gross domestic product this year.
Pakistani officials say they agree on the need for reforms but do not want to sign up to conditions that would derail the economy, with growth set to slow this year to around 4 percent from 5.2 percent last year.
Last month Asad Umar said Pakistan and the IMF had reduced their differences. He has also repeatedly said the IMF was not demanding that Pakistan set a market-oriented exchange rate.
Pakistan says IMF bailout package ‘more or less’ final
Pakistan says IMF bailout package ‘more or less’ final
- Finance minister says hoping for a “full agreement” in the next few days
- Pakistan launched talks with the IMF for its 13th financial assistance package in October
Pakistan PM orders accelerated privatization of power sector to tackle losses
- Tenders to be issued for privatization of three major electricity distribution firms, PMO says
- Sharif says Pakistan to develop battery energy storage through public-private partnerships
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s prime minister on Monday directed the government to speed up privatization of state-owned power companies and improve electricity infrastructure nationwide, as authorities try to address deep-rooted losses and inefficiencies in the energy sector that have weighed on the economy and public finances.
Pakistan’s electricity system has long struggled with financial distress caused by a combination of factors including theft of power, inefficient collection of bills, high costs of generating electricity and a large burden of unpaid obligations known as “circular debt.” In the first quarter of the current financial year, government-owned distribution companies recorded losses of about Rs171 billion ($611 million) due to poor bill recovery and operational inefficiencies, official documents show. Circular debt in the broader power sector stood at around Rs1.66 trillion ($5.9 billion) in mid-2025, a sharp decline from past peaks but still a major fiscal drain.
Efforts to contain these losses have been a focus of Pakistan’s economic reform program with the International Monetary Fund, which has urged structural changes in the energy sector as part of financing conditions. Previous government initiatives have included signing a $4.5 billion financing facility with local banks to ease power sector debt and reducing retail electricity tariffs to support economic recovery.
“Electricity sector privatization and market-based competition is the sustainable solution to the country’s energy problems,” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said at a meeting reviewing the roadmap for power sector reforms, according to a statement from the prime minister’s office.
The meeting reviewed progress on privatization and infrastructure projects. Officials said tenders for modernizing one of Pakistan’s oldest operational hubs, Rohri Railway Station, will be issued soon and that the Ghazi Barotha to Faisalabad transmission line, designed to improve long-distance transmission of electricity, is in the initial approval stages. While not all power-sector decisions were detailed publicly, the government emphasized expanding private sector participation and completing priority projects to strengthen the electricity grid.
In another key development, the prime minister endorsed plans to begin work on a battery energy storage system with participation from private investors to help manage fluctuations in supply and demand, particularly as renewable energy sources such as solar and wind take a growing role in generation. Officials said the concept clearance for the storage system has been approved and feasibility studies are underway.
Government briefing documents also outlined steps toward shifting some electricity plants from imported coal to locally mined Thar coal, where a railway line expansion is underway to support transport of fuel, potentially lowering costs and import dependence in the long term.
State authorities also pledged to address safety by converting unmanned railway crossings to staffed ones and to strengthen food safety inspections at stations, underscoring broader infrastructure and service improvements connected to energy and transport priorities.
