FOR POTENTIAL INVESTORS AROUND THE GLOBE..YOU HAVE A GREAT CHANCE !! WORLD BANK: PAKISTAN SECOND LOWEST COST COUNTRY ( With $877 Billion PPP GDP and $4,450 Per Capita GDP) Pakistan is the second least expensive country in the world. Pakistans GDP is $788 billion as of 2011 based on purchasing power parity (PPP), according to International Comparisons Program (ICP) findings 2011 released yesterday by the World Bank. World Banks International Comparison Program (ICP) does a detailed study of a list of around 800 household and nonhousehold products to compare real purchasing power for trans-national income comparison program (ICP). The latest ICP findings conclude that Pakistans per capita income is US$4,450.00, just slightly below Indias US$4,735.00 ICP Based GDP Per Capita. Source: World Bank At US$4,450 per capita, Pakistans PPP GDP works out to US$788 billion for 2011, and more than a trillion US dollars now. The results of an earlier ICP program for 2005 and 2006 released by Asian Development Bank in 2009 concluded that Pakistans capita income at HK$ 13,528. It reported India’s per capita as HK $12,090. Price Level Index Rankings. Source: World Bank The ICP program uses Price Level Index (PLI) as an indicator of cost of living in a country. It defines PLI as the ratio of a PPP (purchasing power parity) to a corresponding exchange rate. An index over 100 means prices are higher on average than in the world, and one less than 100 means prices are relatively lower. Pakistans PLI of 28.2 ranks it at 176, just above the last-ranked Egypt at 177. Indias PLI of 32.4 ranks it at 127. 23 economies are showing a PLI of 50 or below. The cheapest economies are Egypt, Pakistan, Myanmar, Ethiopia and Lao Peoples Democratic Republic, with indices ranging from 35 to 40. The most expensive economies in GDP terms are Switzerland, Norway, Bermuda, Australia and Denmark, with indices ranging from 210 to 185. The United States ranked 25th in the world, lower than most other high-income economies, including France, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom. Here are some of the other major findings of World Bank ICP 2011: 1. The six largest middle income economies – China, India, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia and Mexico – account for 32.3 percent of world GDP, whereas the 6 largest high income economies – United States, Japan, Germany, France, United Kingdom, and Italy – account for 32.9 percent. 2. Asia and the Pacific, including China and India, accounts for 30 percent of world GDP, Eurostat-OECD 54 percent, Latin America 5.5 percent (excluding Mexico, which participates in the OECD and Argentina, which did not participate in the ICP 2011), Africa and Western Asia about 4.5 percent each. 3. China and India make up two-thirds of the Asia and the Pacific economy, excluding Japan and South Korea, which are part of the OECD comparison. 4. Russia accounts for more than 70 percent of the CIS, and Brazil for 56 percent of Latin America. 5. South Africa, Egypt, and Nigeria account for about half of the African economy. Last week, another survey done by Cato Institute found that Pakistan fares better than its neighbors on world misery index. Back in 1960s, distinguished American economist Arthur Okun defined misery index as sum of inflation and unemployment rates. Americas high misery index was cited by candidate Jimmy Carter as a reason to elect him president in his 1976 presidential race against President Gerald R. Ford. The Cato Institute has now revived it by adding interest rates to the sum of inflation and unemployment rates and subtracting per capita GDP growth rate from it. Pakistan (score 21.9) at 28 ranks below Iran (score 61.6) at 2 and India (score 25.6) at 19 on world misery index rankings for 2013 compiled by Washingtons Cato Institute. Other nations worse off than Pakistan on the list include Serbia, Argentina, Jamaica, Egypt, Spain, South Africa, Brazil, Greece, Macedonia, Palestine, Turkey, Cyprus, Croatia, Dominican Republic, Georgia, Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica, Jordan, Ukraine, Peru, Uruguay, Portugal and Barbados. Indonesia (score 21.6) at 29 is only slightly better off than Pakistan. Earlier this year, Economist Intelligence Units latest Worldwide Cost of Living survey revealed that Pakistan’s Karachi is the second cheapest city of the world in 2014 while India’s Mumbai is the cheapest. The top 10 cheapest cities include Mumbai, Karachi, New Delhi, Kathmandu, Damascus, Algiers, Bucharest, Panama City, Jeddah and Riyadh in that order, according to EIU.
Posted on: Thu, 01 May 2014 12:30:38 +0000