ISLAMABAD: Pakistan is seeking the Asian Development Bank’s scaled-up financing for public-private partnerships, including the flagship $10 billion Karachi-Peshawar Main Railway Line (ML-1).

An ADB delegation led by its Vice President for South, Central and West Asia, Yingming Yang, is currently in Islamabad as part of a follow-up to the $10bn Country Partnership Strategy 2026-30, approved in March this year.

The delegation had separate engagements with Minister for Economic Affairs Ahad Khan Cheema and Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb on Wednesday.

Pakistan has already secured $2bn in financing from the Manila-based lending agency for the Karachi-Rohri section of the 1670-km ML-1 project, which is under implementation. Informed sources said the Economic Affairs Division was discussing additional facilities with the ADB, including innovative products such as guarantees and private partnerships. EAD spokesperson Sabina Qureshi did not respond to a request for comment.

Seeks scaled-up financing for ML-1, public-private partnerships

Acknowledging the CPS 2026-30 approvals by the ADB board, Mr Cheema discussed the government’s key development priorities including comprehensive fiscal, structural and governance reforms.

He said these measures, undertaken over the last 3-4 years in close coordination with key development partners, including the IMF, ADB, and the World Bank, had already helped restore confidence and create a stronger foundation for sustainable economic growth, while also contributing to macroeconomic stability, growth, and credit rating upgrades.

He “highlighted ML-1 as a national flagship project” and reported that privatisation was the government’s priority, and that effective frameworks for public-private partnerships, improving implementation, and developing a strong pipeline of commercially viable projects were in process. “He also urged ADB to scale up Private Sector Operations in Pakistan”, an official statement said.

The ADB Vice-President welcomed the improvements in Pakistan’s sovereign credit ratings by international rating agencies and noted efforts towards strengthening macroeconomic stability. “He appreciated the government’s initiative to introduce project readiness reforms and also acknowledged that Pakistan provided an opportunity to ADB to introduce innovative financing instruments in Pakistan such as policy-based guarantee and guarantee for issuance of Panda bonds,” the EAD statement said.

The ADB official also acknowledged the strong momentum generated by Pakistan on ML-1 and reaffirmed ADB’s commitment to working closely with the government to facilitate progress towards the early groundbreaking of the project. He also proposed establishing a working group to address Railways Institutional Reforms and assured that the process would be initiated promptly to provide an effective platform.

Mr Yang also had a separate engagement with the finance minister and appreciated progress in macroeconomic stabilisation, improvements achieved in fiscal management, the external account and overall economic stability and resultant positive developments in sovereign credit ratings, describing the progress as evidence of the country’s continued reform efforts and improved economic fundamentals.

Published in Dawn, September 3rd, 2026