ECC okays Rs34bn grants to secure $50m WB tranche

A few weeks before the next fiscal year’s budget, the government on Monday approved about Rs34.4 billion worth of supplementary grants mostly to secure World Bank loans and set maximum retail price (MRPs) of four newly registered categories of cardiac stents. The decisions were taken at a meeting of the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet, presided over by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, which also allowed expansion in the exploration licence area and extension in the well testing period to Oil and Gas Development Company Ltd (OGDCL) and United Energy Pakistan Ltd (UEPL), respectively. The meeting approved a Rs13.2bn supplementary grant, equivalent to $50 million to be obtained from the World Bank as the first tranche of a $85m credit line, to Pakistan Mortgage Refinance Company Ltd (PMRCL) set up in June 2018 as a joint venture of nine local banks and International Finance Corporation (IFC) — a commercial arm of the WB.