Pakistan is likely to miss its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth target for fiscal year 2016-17 of 5.7 per cent due to lower-than-expected output from the industrial and agricultural sectors in the first nine months of the said year, statisticians said Wednesday.
GDP growth for the ongoing fiscal year (which ends June 30, 2017) is now projected to clock in at 5.28pc.
The matter was discussed in the 98th meeting of the National Accounts Committee, chaired by the secretary of the Statistics Division.
The GDP growth estimates for 2016-17 were built on the latest data available for the last six to nine months extrapolated to the whole year.
According to provisional data, the agricultural, industrial and services sectors are now expected to record growth of 3.46pc, 5.02pc and 5.98pc, respectively.
Agricultural sector
The agriculture sector is expected to grow 3.46pc, a little lower than the targetted 3.48pc, statisticians said.
Growth of crops during the year is expected to come to 3.02pc, with the five important crops — wheat, maize, rice, sugarcane and cotton — estimated to grow 0.5pc, 16.3pc, 0.7pc, 12.4pc and 7.6pc, respectively.
The livestock sector is expected to grow 3.43pc, as expected, said the officials.
Industrial sector
Overall growth in the industrial sector was expected to come to only 5.02pc, compared to the targetted 7.69pc, officials said.
Breaking down the numbers, officials said the mining and quarrying sector would grow 1.34pc, while large scale manufacturing would expand 5.06pc.
The main contributors to this growth would be sugar (29.33pc), cement (7.19pc), tractors (72.9pc), trucks (39.31pc) and buses (19.71pc).
Electricity and gas production is expected to grow 3.40pc due to reduced subsidies for the Water and Power Development Authority and its associated companies and K-Electric.
Construction activity will expand 9.05pc, the data revealed.
Services sector
The services sector overall is expected to grow 5.98pc through the year, topping the 5.7pc target.
Wholesale and retail trade sectors will grow 6.82pc, as they are dependent on the output of agriculture, manufacturing and imports, the officials said.
Agriculture-related services look to grow 3.46pc, manufacturing-related by 5.27pc, while import-related will expand 19.32pc.
Transport, storage and communication are expected to grow 3.94pc.
Finance and insurance are expected to show an overall increase of 10.77pc, mainly due to higher growth in deposits (15pc) and loans (11pc).
General government services are expected to expand 6.91pc, mainly driven by the increase in salaries and inflation.
