Pakistan agrees with the demand of IMF to give priority to climate -friendly projects

• Govt to update project selection criteria for PSDP.
• Pakistan will report the selection process.
• Pakistan will also apply adjustment evaluation.

Islamabad: Pakistan has agreed with the requirements of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to inform the project selection and increase climate change weighing criteria by August next year, with carbon remuneration to be announced in the next budget, The news reported.

Pakistan has agreed with the IMF’s request that all new infrastructure projects costing more than RS7.5 billion should have the PC-1 Plan Committee published on the PC website. The government will enhance project assessments and climate control estimates to prioritize infrastructure with the greatest impact, according to top official sources.

The official said that Pakistan and the world lender have decided to expand the federal government’s budget system to include grant and subsidy costs. They will also use the same process to highlight provincial government spending, the official added.

He also pledged the IMF to work to highlight and monitor the harmful costs of climate and to harmonize the budget labeling with other green registrations. The government will inform the project selection criteria for the Public Sector Development Program (PSDP) to prioritize climate -friendly projects.

Climate change estimates will represent at least 30% of the selection criteria for infrastructure projects. A transparent scoring system will be developed with explicit protocols to evaluate projects.

The government will publish the distribution of new projects by August 2026. In addition, Pakistan will report the selection process and will publish grades for any project approved by Central Labor Development (CDWP) and the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) annually.

Pakistan will also apply the adaptation and mitigation assessment by the end of August 2027. All new major infrastructure projects will undertake the evaluations of vulnerability, adaptation and mitigation of the climate as a critical requirement for inclusion in the PSDP.