KARACHI: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said on Wednesday that the stock market was a good example of brisk business activity and talked about the tefforts that could hasten pace of economic growth.

He was speaking at a ceremony for presentation of KSE Top-25 awards. The PM presented awards to 49 listed companies which had secured place among the Top-25 companies for each of the four years, 2010 to 2013.

He generally sidelined market-related issues and dilated on the economy with promises for further growth in the future.

Finance Minister Ishaq Dar said that the country’s economy had achieved position of stability since May 2013.

“Governments before us also announced reforms, but the element of effective implementation was missing,” Dar said, and claimed that the PML-N government had not only introduced reforms, but also ensured implementation which had yielded positive results.

He observed that the government wanted to take the country from a stable economic position to the league of emerging economies. Dar talked of foreign exchange reserves which stood at $16.13bn.

Dar said: “Despite tremendous pressures on the government when it came to power, untiring efforts have enabled us to achieve GDP growth of 4.1pc last year and we are on target of achieving 5.1pc GDP growth this fiscal year.”

He pointed out that six reviews were successfully completed under the IMF’s Extended Fund Facility and said that the Fund had appreciated Pakistan’s economic performance and acknowledged reforms.

He said that the major initiatives now under way in terms of power generation, transmission system upgrades, LNG and coal-based projects would transform the landscape of the power sector within the next few years.

“With the launch of new IT regime (3G, 4G licences), 900,000 jobs would be created,” Dar claimed.

KSE chairman Munir Kamal said that the market had some tax-related issues, which would be presented to the finance minister in the budget proposals 2015-16.

On the sidelines of the event, brokers and representatives of some asset management companies (AMCs) gave their observations and suggestions on the recent regulatory measures, to which the minister was said to have given a patient hearing.

Published in Dawn, March 26th, 2015

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