Daily Times

Pakistan earned $500.158 million by providing different travel services in various countries during the fiscal year 2020-21. This shows an increase of 2.10 percent as compared to $489.850 million. The same services were provided during the corresponding period of fiscal year 2019-20, Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) said. During the period under review, the personal travel services also rose by 2.83 percent, from $484.450 million last fiscal year to $498.148 million during July-June 2020-21. Among these personal services, the exports of personal expenditure witnessed growth of 31.61 percent while the education related expenditure increased by 1.83 percent.

In addition, the other personal services rose by 2.76 percent, out of which religious travel services dipped by 86.24 percent while other travel services witnessed an increase of 2.87 percent.

Meanwhile, the exports of business services dipped by 62.78 percent, from $5.400 million to $2.010 million, the PBS data revealed. It is pertinent to mention here that the services trade deficit of the country during the fiscal year (2020-21) decreased by 43.45 percent as compared to the corresponding period of last year. During the period from July-June 2020-21, services exports however increased by 9.19 percent, whereas imports reduced by 10.75 percent, according to data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics.

The services worth $5.937 billion exported during the period under review compared the exports of $5.437 billion in the same period of last year, whereas imports of services into the country were recorded at $7.812 billion as against the imports of $8.753 billion, the data revealed.