ISLAMABAD: A local research-based think tank has concluded that none of the current governments, either federal or provincial, have improved economic indicators within their respective jurisdictions.

The third tracking report for the period between April and June, launched on Wednesday by Policy Research Institute of Market Economy (PRIME), says that none of the five governments – in the centre and the four provinces – are moving ahead to implement the economic agendas stated in their manifestos.

The report, launched by PRIME Executive Director Ali Salman, said the federal government had failed to achieve any significant progress in resolving the issues of circular debt, energy crisis or tax reforms.

Titled ‘Succumbing to the Temporal’, the report mentions that the performance of PML-N’s federal government had decreased by around 3.13 per cent in the segment of economic revival.

The energy security segment has dropped by 5.29 per cent compared to the previous quarter, while the overall score is down by 3.48 per cent in the April-June quarter, the report claims.

Among the components of the energy security segment, the only area where the government has shown improvement is the reformation of power distribution companies (Discos), whereas no development was seen in reforming Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra).

Regarding the economic revival, the report says that PML-N seems to be getting politically distracted since day-one and it needs to realise the importance of long-term sustainable reforms for the freedom and prosperity of the citizens.

Scores in the tax reforms component have comparatively declined as well, since there was no improvement in the field of rationalising sales tax. “The discretionary powers of FBR’s officials still work wonders,” the report says.

It has highlighted that important segments of PML-N’s economic agenda remain far from being fulfilled. The party’s manifestos to “build the confidence of private sector”, “double the GDP growth-rate from three to six per cent”, “bring investment-to-GDP ratio to 20 per cent” and “increase investment in energy sector” have remained on the downside, compared to the previous quarter.

Similarly, the promise of “keeping the interest rate lower” has failed to materialise, while the component of industry and trade policy has shown a steady decline in the efficacy of government’s policy – “In short, no confidence,” the report declares.

However, certain parameters have improved, including creation of job opportunities, along with improvements in state-owned enterprises, social security and the publication of annual tax directory, which have been lauded in the report.

The tracking report has also worked on the performance of provincial governments in the same quarter, but the data on Balochistan was not available.

The provincial scorecards included components such as agriculture and livestock, taxation, health, education, labour and human resources, transport, housing, industrial development and e-governance.

The average score of Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI)’s economic agenda in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government was 3.82 out of 10, the government’s performance was titled as ‘Idealism without any ideal’.

Similarly, the overall score of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) government in Sindh was 3.31 out of 10, but the performance monitor of the Punjab government was comparatively better with a score of 4.60 out of 10.

Published in Dawn, July 24th, 2014