ISLAMABAD, Jan 12: Caretaker Minister for Finance Dr Salman Shah said here on Saturday that despite many shocks and difficulties, the economy of the country was flourishing well.

Talking to DawnNews TV, he said a couple of weeks ago, a big refinery project costing $5billion was inaugurated in the country at Khalifa point.

He said global scenario had some global impacts, which is impacting all economies of the world, including Pakistan.

Dr Shah said food prices in the world have gone up by 40 per cent, because of the rapid increase in international oil prices, which resulted in the suffering of all economies, including the non-producing economies.

International wheat prices have doubled in the last three months from almost $200 to 250 per ton, and now these have gone up to $500 per ton, he added.

He said that the country is facing many serious challenges, including extremism and terrorism. This challenge is not only for government, but also for the whole nation.

Pakistan’s economy is improving over at above six per cent. It can also grow at eight per cent, as it has grown at seven per cent in the last five years.

To a question, he said unemployment rate had come down from 8.3 to 5.3pc in the country.

Dr Shah said Atta (flour) was also priority for the government, and it was releasing 32,000 tons of wheat everyday and the government was providing atta directly to consumers.

The price of atta was coming down in Sindh and Punjab as the government was releasing huge amount of wheat.

He said the issue was its supply in the NWFP, because a lot of atta which comes to the NWFP, crosses the border, and now the NWFP government was involved in wheat distribution to consumers.

He said that in the budget various subsidisies has been included and one of which was on the oil side. The government was bearing the burden, and providing billions of rupees as subsidy in oil sector to provide oil to common consumer at an affordable price.

He said they have seen that in the last six months the prices had a sufficient increase.

He said now there was an environment of globalisation, adding the country had shortage of gas and oil and now the government was importing it, and for that purpose the government had just signed agreements with Iran.

He said talks on oil supply had started with Iran in 1993, and it was only taken seriously in the last five years.

To a question regarding the energy, he said 14,000 new villages have been electrified and over 1.1 million new gas connections have been provided. —APP