Carbon levy on the cards after IMF funding secured
Pakistan and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have agreed to introduce a new carbon levy, reduce electricity tariffs, increase water pricing, and open up the automobile sector to global trade under the Staff-Level Agreement (SLA), announced on Wednesday. “The IMF team has reached a SLA with the Pakistani authorities on the first review of the 37-month Extended Arrangement under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF), and on a new 28-month arrangement under the IMF’s Resilience and Sustainability Facility (RSF) with total access over the 28 months of around $1.3 billion,” the Fund said in a statement. This takes the combined volume of IMF support for Pakistan to about $8.3bn. The agreement is subject to the approval of the IMF’s Executive Board. Upon approval, Pakistan will have access to about $1bn under the EFF, bringing total disbursements under the programme to about $2bn.