Turbulence faced by Pakistan's national air carrier reflects state of Pak economy

New Delhi: Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) that once transported the country’s diaspora to USA, Europe and Gulf is facing its worst turbulence and is in deep trouble.

Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) net loss of Rs. 19.26 billion, increased by 54.08 percent in 2020 compared with the last year.

Over and above that licences of over 50 of its 800-plus pilots have cancelled. These licences were fraudulently procured.


Number of countries have disallowed the PIA to fly in for reasons of security.

PIA is also symbolic of the state of Pakistan’s economy. For the first time in 25 months, net foreign direct investment (FDI) in Pakistan, turned negative at $16 million in November on the back of outflows from the power and communication sectors, latest data released by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) showed last week.

In November, foreign portfolio offloaded stocks worth $39.9m compared to $37.08m in October. On a cumulative basis, the SBP data showed FDI during the July-November period decreased by 17 per cent to $717m from $864.4m during the same period last fiscal year.

The Pak government paid $11.895 billion in external public debt servicing during 2019-20, as per SBP data released officially. The amount was 23 per cent higher than $9.645bn paid in 2018-19.

Pak PM told Samaa TV channel recently that he had made a grave error in not going to the Wold Bank and the International Monetary Fund as soon as he took office in August 2018.

Dawn newspaper in its editorial (December 20, 2020) has pointed at multiple reasons why Pakistan has turned into a heavily indebted nation. The editorial points to a “debt trap.”