ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s exports of goods increased by 18 percent to $25.3 billion during the last fiscal year, said the commerce ministry on Thursday, adding it was the highest growth rate recorded in the country’s history.

The ministry informed that the export of services during FY21 had been projected at $5.9 billion, implying that Pakistan’s overall exports had surpassed $31 billion.

“This is a remarkable achievement by our exporters considering the difficulties created by COVID-19 at home and resultant contractions in our major markets,” the prime minister’s advisor on commerce, Abdul Razak Dawood, said in a statement.

“It was not an easy task as many countries went into lockdown which severely affected the business,” he continued. “Not only our exports survived the crisis but also we enhanced them in many sectors. I salute our exporters on achieving the milestone.”

Meanwhile, the commerce ministry maintained the government had taken several measures to improve industrial competitiveness by rationalizing customs duty and other tariff forms.

“Since 2018-19, tariff on more than 4,000 inputs (i.e. raw materials, intermediate and capital goods) have been rationalized,” it said in the official statement. “As a result, almost 40 percent of total inputs in terms of number of tariff lines as well as value of imports are at zero percent duty.”

The ministry maintained it would continue with the tariff reforms in the coming years.

“With the current measures exports are expected to grow by five percent in the next two years,” said the statement.