KARACHI: Business owners have started gaining confidence as their expectations for a better future have risen 42 per cent from the preceding quarter, shows a latest survey conducted by Gallup Pakistan.

“Relatively fewer business owners are pessimistic about future conditions and the direction of the country compared to Quarter 2,” according to the Gallup Business Confidence Index report based on the survey of business owners in the third quarter of 2023.

A statement by Gallup Pakistan said business insecurity still persists because of the prevailing economic and political crises even though businesses are more upbeat about their future.

“Inflation, utility bills and political instability cause growing concerns among the business community. But overall, fewer businesses express hopelessness compared to the previous quarter,” it said.

As for their expectations for future conditions, the businesses were “surprisingly optimistic”: 61pc of them expressed positive expectations while 38pc of them reported they expected the situation to worsen. The net future business confidence score improved 42pc since Spring and is now at 22pc.

The businessmen’s perceptions about the direction of the country have also improved for the last two quarters with 26pc of respondents saying Pakistan was heading in the right direction.

The overall confidence of the business community, however, was low because of unrelenting economic crises 2022. The economic insecurity in the country has worsened since the beginning of this year, but the business-situation score has improved by 25 percentage points.

Published in Dawn, December 30th, 2023