What happened
The Annual Plan Coordination Committee (APCC) approved a macroeconomic framework for FY2026-27 on 1 June 2026 that targets economic growth of 4 per cent and inflation of 8.2 per cent, and recommended a record national development outlay of Rs4.715 trillion, according to the Press Information Department.
The committee, chaired by Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Ahsan Iqbal, cleared the framework for formal approval by the National Economic Council (NEC), which is chaired by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and was due to meet on 3 June.
According to the APCC working paper, GDP growth for FY2025-26 came in at 3.7 per cent, missing the official target of 4.2 per cent but improving on the revised 3.2 per cent recorded in FY2024-25. In January, S&P Global Market Intelligence projected Pakistan’s real GDP growth at 3.5pc in FY26 and 4.4pc in FY27.
Why it matters
The FY2026-27 framework targets 3.8 per cent growth in agriculture, 4 per cent in industry and 4.2 per cent in services, with large-scale manufacturing projected to expand by 4.5 per cent. National savings are targeted at 14.3 per cent of GDP and investment at 15 per cent, including private investment of 10.3 per cent, Dawn reported.
The plan estimates the creation of about two million jobs in FY2026-27, with 1.1 million in services, 500,000 in industry and 400,000 in agriculture.
The proposed development outlay of Rs4.715 trillion includes a federal Public Sector Development Programme of Rs1.126 trillion, provincial Annual Development Programmes of Rs3.138 trillion and Rs451 billion of investment by state-owned enterprises from their own resources. Officials said more than 98 per cent of available resources would go to ongoing projects, with priority for water, energy, transport and other core infrastructure.
Planning officials said the targets were framed against the strains of the Middle East conflict and limited fiscal space, and noted that the federal development allocation relative to the total budget and GDP has been falling since 2018 even as the gap between provincial programmes and the federal PSDP widens. The inflation target of 8.2 per cent is above the 7.1 per cent average estimated for the outgoing year, a trend tracked earlier in this report on Pakistan’s recent price pressures.
