Budget & Business
By Col. Riaz Jafri (Retd.)
Rawalpindi, Pakistan

Preparations for the fiscal budget 2006-2007 are afoot and as usual facts and figures will be kept secret from the public till the last moment. Soon the CBR offices will be placed out-of-bounds for all visitors and its employees ‘quarantined’ to deny them any contact with the outside world lest they leak any vital information. Trade and import policies will also be revised which when announced suddenly will come as a bomb shell to the unwary businessman who would have worked out his imports and exports based upon the previous year’s policies. All trade in the pipe line would suffer one way or the other.
Such a practice offers the CBR and the government with an ideal opportunity to oblige their favourites in the business community by letting them in on some of the secrets before hand. Others try their utmost with fair and unfair means to get an inkling of the coming taxes and levies. This not only opens doors to corruption. Remember, a few years ago the knowledgeable withdrawing their pounds and dollars from the banks late in the night hours before NS froze all FE accounts in the country? The unscrupulous hoarders and traders make items of daily use disappear from the market only to reappear on the shelves with increased prices, thus becoming richer by the millions overnight.
It is, therefore, suggested that the government should announce its budget and trade policies six months ahead, say on July 1st each year to be implemented with effect from January 1st of the following year. This will give enough time to all to plan their business activities. At the same time no hoarder will hoard the goods for six months and the public, the media and the assemblies will have plenty of time to discuss the nitty-gritty of the budget and trade policies threadbare to the satisfaction of all. No business in the pipeline will suffer and the businessmen will be able to plan properly what to import and how and when. This scheme of affairs is nothing new either and is being practiced by a few countries – for example South Korea. But will the CBR or the government kill a goose laying the golden eggs?

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Editor: Akhtar M. Faruqui
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