ISLAMABAD – Pakistan is expected to increase its military spending in theyears to come by several billion dollars, a recent report suggests.
As per the “Pakistani Defense Market – Attractiveness, CompetitiveLandscape and Forecasts to 2024,” the country is expected to spend $48.5billion from 2020 to 2024 on defense.——————————
The amount is around $6 billion more than what it invested in the past fouryears – from 2015 to 2019. The move is mandatory to manage internalinstability and bolster its defense capabilities concerning India, suggeststhe report.
Between 2015 and 2019, the US military aid was halted and thus thecountry’s defense budget increased at a sluggish rate – not to mention thedeteriorating economic situation as well.
Pakistan invested $7.6 billion in the defense sector in 2015 with acompound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 0.69 percent, which jumped up to $7.8billion in 2019.——————————
In the last four years, the country’s average capital expenditureallocation per annum remained at 36.8% of the total defense budget, whileits revenue expenditure allocation was 63.2%.
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In the next four years, the country is expected to push the average capitalallocation for military hardware up-gradation to 37.8 percent.——————————
Pakistan suffered a massive setback when the US halted arms supply in theaftermath of the conflicts between the two countries over Afghanistan.
To recover from that, the country’s defense industry increased itsindigenous capabilities to fulfill a majority of the national requirements.However, it still seeks China’s help for technologically advanced defenseequipment.
The report suggests that the Pakistani export market will gradually growover the forecast period on the back of its high-quality indigenous defensesystems.
