As Pakistan finalizes a $7 billion staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), policymakers have been alarmed by an unresolved $6 billion annual discrepancy in the country’s trade data, which reportedly remains unaddressed despite repeated reminders from the Fund.
According to official documents, the issue of inconsistent trade figures was once again raised by the IMF mission during its visit to Islamabad from September 25 to October 8, 2025. In response, the government decided to form a new high-level committee to examine and correct the data mismatch.
The committee will be led by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) which operates under the Ministry of Planning and will include representatives from the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) and the International Trade and Finance Wing of the ministry.
According to media reports, the government attributed the widening gap to the transition of the trade reporting system from the Pakistan Revenue Automation Limited (PRAL) platform to the Pakistan Single Window (PSW) system.
Under the General Statistics Act 2011, the PBS is the country’s sole regulatory authority for national statistical matters, with the mandate to monitor, harmonize, and analyze trade and financial data.
Officials revealed that the trade data discrepancy reached $6 billion in the last fiscal year, while the cumulative gap over the past five years has ballooned to between $25 and $30 billion.
The persistent inconsistency in trade reporting has raised serious concerns among both IMF officials and Pakistan’s economic managers, as it complicates the country’s balance-of-payments calculations and external financing assessments.
