On Thursday, former Vice President of FPCCI Atif Ikram Sheikh said inflation has increased a lot. At the same time, the purchasing power of the people has become the lowest compared to other countries in the region. In these circumstances, the wage increase has become inevitable to enable the masses to bring food to the table, he said. He added that raising wages will increase inflation, but inflation is the only option we have to fight merciless inflation.

Atif Ikram Sheikh, who has also served as President of ICCI and Chairman of PVMA, said in a statement issued here today that the Central Bank is ready to increase interest rates while the government is mulling to increase the fuel price by Rs 10 per litre.

The SBP wants to increase interest rates to combat inflation and stabilise forex reserves, but this will only increase the problems of the government as the cost of borrowing and debt servicing will increase.

He observed that such a move would put a dent in the business community’s confidence and would multiply their problems.

On the other hand, the government has decided to increase the oil price by ten rupees per litre, increasing inflation in the country. At the same time, the people and businesses will be badly affected.

A levy of 60 rupees is being collected on petrol and 50 rupees on diesel, and it will increase further with the increase in the oil price.

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia and Russia have announced to cut oil production by 1.3 million barrels per day, which will increase the price of oil, while the cost of LNG is also growing in the global market.

He said that increased fuel prices will damage most of the population of energy-importing countries.

He said that economic and trade balance improvements should control currency depreciation to relieve the masses. Taxing the untaxed sectors and improving tax collection should increase the resources needed to finance the subsidies to keep the poor population afloat.