04 July 2004	Sunday	15 Jamadi-ul-Awwal 1425

ISLAMABAD, July 3: Prime minister-in-waiting Shaukat Aziz has directed the officials of the ministry of finance to focus on achieving 8 per cent GDP growth rate by 2006-07.

Official sources told Dawn here on Saturday that a directive had been issued to the concerned officials to accomplish 8 per cent GDP growth rate, specially by extending maximum cooperation to the private sector.

Mr Aziz was quoted as saying that difficult challenges like sustaining and accelerating growth momentum, creating employment opportunities, reducing social gap, reducing poverty and improving the country's physical infrastructure could not be met without achieving a formidable 8 per cent growth rate.

The government has set a GDP growth target of 6.6 per cent for 2004-05 against 6.4 per cent of the last financial year.

"There should not be a problem of consistency and continuity and there should not be any U-turn as far as the economic policies are concerned," Mr Aziz was quoted as having said.

Sources said since the finance minister enjoyed full confidence of President Gen Pervez Musharraf, Mr Aziz would be presiding over all important meetings on various issues like water, law and order after becoming the prime minister.

Currently, the president presides over such important meetings.

"The president wants Mr Aziz to be an effective future prime minister and takes control of important matters," a source said.

He said the president had asked Mr Aziz to also concentrate on implementation process, in the absence of which, objectives of good governance and further improving the economy could not be adequately achieved.

However, the sources said Mr Aziz was expected by the president to ensure "political stability" in order to achieve higher GDP growth rate. Similarly, the finance minister was expected to increase public spending and enhance private investment which were important elements to ensure 8 per cent growth rate by 2006-07.

The sources said higher GDP growth rates would be difficult to achieve without accelerating reforms in the Central Board of Revenue, including a complete reorganization and fundamental changes in human resource management. Likewise, there was a need to develop a long-term vision for agriculture and power sector with substantial investment in irrigation sectors, they added.

"It may not be an easy task to achieve 8 per cent GDP rate by 2006-07 without raising priority poverty spending by 2 per cent of GDP to about 7 per cent by 2007," a source said.

He said containing overall fiscal deficit to 3 per cent of GDP on average during 2004-07 was also a difficult undertaking.

Real GDP growth surpassed the target (5.3 per cent) with aheadline number of 6.4 per cent during 2003-04 compared to last year's 5.1 per cent rate. And this buoyant growth rate was aided by a 13.1 per cent and 5.2 per cent growth in the manufacturing and services sectors, respectively.