The Overseas Investors Chamber of Commerce and Industry (OICCI) shared the results of its comprehensive Business Confidence Index (BCI) Survey – Wave 20 conducted throughout the country between May and July 2021.

The survey revealed that the overall Business Confidence Score (BCS) in Pakistan now stands at a positive score of nine percent, a record improvement by 59 percent from the previous negative 50 percent score in the Wave 19 Survey that was conducted in May 2020.

It may be noted that a positive BCI was last seen during Wave 16 conducted in April 2018.

Conducted periodically, the OICCI BCI Survey contains comprehensive feedback from frontline business stakeholders of their views on the environment and opportunities impacting their business operations. The feedback covers business environment at regional, national, sectorial, and own business entity levels in the last six months, and the anticipated business and investment environment in the next six months.

This survey is done face-to-face in nine cities, covering 80 percent of the GDP, with higher weightage given to the key business centers of Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi-Islamabad, and Faisalabad.

The survey sample consisted of 40 percent respondents from the Manufacturing sector, 35 percent from the Services sector, and 25 percent from retailers/wholesalers.

The confidence of the business community across Pakistan in shifting from negative territory in the last survey to positive territory is driven by all the three segments — Manufacturing, Services, and Retail/Wholesale — with the first two recording an increase of 65 percent each, (Manufacturing from -48 percent to 17 percent, and Services from -59 percent to six percent) while the Retail/Wholesale sector went up by 44 percent (from -44 percent to 0).

Source: Pro Pakistani