Sardar Yasir Ilyas Khan, President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ICCI) said that keeping in view the challenges being created by the Covid-19 pandemic, the business community of the country was expecting further cut in the policy interest rate to bring it down to below 5 percent that would have helped the businesses in achieving better growth and expansion. However, the SBP has maintained the interest rate at 7 percent in the new bi-monthly monetary policy, which has disappointed the business community.
Sardar Yasir Ilyas Khan said that many countries of the world had made drastic cut in the policy interest rate to enable the businesses to combat the impact of Covid-19 and it was high time that the SBP should have provided relief to the business community by making a further reduction in the rate so that businesses were able to cope with the situation emerging after the coronavirus.
ICCI President said that the second wave of Covid-19 was on the rise and businesses were facing problems due to lockdowns in many parts of the country. In these circumstances, the government should have reduced the interest rate to less than 5 percent to ease the problems of the business sector. He said that bringing down the interest rate would help in reviving the business activities and encouraging new investment in the country. He further said that till the issue of Covid-19 was resolved, the government should defer the receipt of loans with interest from the businesses so that they could be saved from bankruptcy in these tough times. Ms. Fatma Azim Senior Vice President and Abdul Rehman Khan Vice President ICCI said that the best option for the government to revive the economy was to facilitate the growth of business and investment activities and added that making significant cut in the policy interest rate would greatly help in achieving this goal.