ISLAMABAD, Jan 1: Four major foreign missions will visit Pakistan this month to assess the funding requirements of the new political government.

Official sources said here on Wednesday that the World Bank, the IMF, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Japan’s Bank of International Cooperation had confirmed that their high-level missions would be arriving in Islamabad during the current month for extending increased financial support to Pakistan.

The World Bank, sources said, had indicated to increase its annual assistance from $400 million to $800 million during the calender year 2003. However, it desired that Pakistan remain creditworthy, specially by continuing to implement structural reforms initiated during the last three years period.

Pakistan had also been informed that the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a subsidiary of the World Bank, was expected to provide $250 million over the next three years. The IFC lending would mainly be for the private sector to help set up new industries in the country.

Several institutional development (IDF) grants had also been lined up by the World Bank in 2003 to assist the new government for developing and implementing policy reforms in key areas, including the support to the National Reconstruction Bureau (NRB) and backing for reforms in the regulatory and legal policy environment.

The IMF mission, sources said, was coming to conduct the quarterly review of Oct-Dec 2002 to extend the next tranche of about $109 million by late February or early March this year.

The mission would also conduct expenditure management review to ensure that more funds were allocated for social sector development and non-development expenditure was cut considerably.

However, the IMF, sources said, was expecting the government to implement full and on-time planned steps towards establishing a broader tax base and reducing the scope of rent-seeking, such as the elimination of various tax exemptions and the introduction of universal self-assessment for income tax.

The IMF mission, they said, would also insist during meetings with the senior officials of the ministry of finance to improve what was being termed the “disappointing performance” of the various relevant agencies to adequately recover tax on agriculture income.

The mission would also ask the authorities to ensure achieving Rs460 billion revenue collection target during 2002-2003. And if the target was not likely to be met then the government should work out a timely contingency measures on the revenue sides, notably accelerating the harmonisation of petroleum taxation.

The ADB mission, sources said, would assess the situation to offer $1 billion assistance during 2003. It had approved roughly $900 million assistance in 2002.

The bank had earlier approved $350 million soft loan for the development of five-year agriculture sector programme in December last year. The first tranche of $125 million would be disbursed as soon as various compliance measures were met.

The primary objective of the agriculture sector programme loan (ASPL) would be to improve agriculture productivity and profitability. It includes special reform measures to promote efficient markets for the major commodities, including wheat, cotton, rice, sugar, fertiliser and seeds.

While the ADB had approved a major agriculture loan programme, a number of its ongoing development projects worth $450 million in Sindh were experiencing delays in implementation due to unfamiliarity with the bank’s procedures.

The officials of the bank had said that the delay was also being caused due to government’s approval formalities and decisions on procurement matters. The bank wanted to streamline various procedures so that unnecessary delays in completing ongoing development projects in Sindh could be avoided.

Japan’s Bank of International Cooperation, sources said, would hold talks with Pakistani officials to offer new lending on soft terms. This lending could mainly be sought by the private sector.

Pakistan and Japan are also expected to shortly hold bilateral talks to revive Tokyo’s annual $500 million assistance as part of the yen credit for the new government.