Pakistan's economy structure
 

Characterized as semi-industrialized, Pakistan’s economy has grown tremendously since its independence in 1947. Punjab and Karachi states constitute the major share in the economic growth of the country. During the 1990s, the growth became slower due to imprudent policies and internal instability that has always been a part of the country. The first decade of the 21st century has experienced wide-ranging economic reforms particularly in manufacturing and financial services sector, leading to improvement in the country’s economic outlook.



Pakistan's economic progress has been impeded by internal disputes and its long confrontation with India within the country for many years. The country's decades-long battle with India over territorial disputes had choked up large military spending, resulting in huge nation debt burden.

Pakistan's weak economy also depends heavily on foreign donors, such as the World Trade Organization, IMF, World Bank, and countries like the US. For instance, the US have reduced Pakistan's bilateral debts by 1 billion in 2003, and a further 500 million in 2004. Pakistan also receives US$2.11 billion in aid from its ally countries.
Economic Geography

Pakistan has a total area of 796,095 square km. With 24.4 percent of arable land, Pakistan boasts as one of the largest producers of commodities in the world that includes apricot, buffalo milk, chickpea, cotton, dates, mango, online, rice, oranges, sugarcane, tangerines and wheat.
Pakistan also has large amount of natural resources which include oil, coal, iron, ore copper, salt and gold. It has the world's second largest salt mine, second largest coal reservoirs and fifth largest gold mine. However, inadequate infrastructure and funds hinders the exploration of natural resources in the country, with an estimated 70 percent of resources are still not discovered.
Population and Labour Force

Pakistan has a population of 187.342 million people, and is the 6th more populated country in the world, after Brazil. It has a labour force of 55.77 million people. In 2010, unemployment rate in Pakistan is 6.195 percent.

Even though Pakistan has the 10th largest labour market in the world, it has a huge labour export with millions of their workers are working abroad. Saudi Arabia has the largest market of Pakistan workers in the world, with over 1.5 million Pakistani in the country. United Kingdom(UK), the United States(US) and the United Arab Emirate (UAE) also boast significant population of Pakistani workers, at around 1 to 1.2 million people.

Pakistan's large labour export market have also raised huge amount of remittance. amounting to a total of US$9.4 billion in 2010, and is placed among the top 10 countries receiving the highest amount of remittance. The majority of the Pakistani workers abroad are skilled, and are employed in jobs such as electrician, painter, plumber, technician and carpenter. Professional jobs such as doctors, engineers, teachers, bankers, IT and telecom experts, and accountants are also taken up by them, and makes up 10 percent of the Pakistani migrant workers.

In 2010, experts estimate that there are 10 million children working as child labour in Pakistan, approximately 18 percent of the entire workforce. Most children work in the agriculture industry, while a significant number work in urban areas weaving carpets, manufacturing surgical instruments and sporting goods for exports. These child workers suffer from a system of 'bonded labour', in which the child workers use their labour to repay the debt owed by someone else.
Industry Sector

Industry is important to Pakistan's economy. It contributes 23.6 percent to the nation's total GDP and employs 20.3 percent of the total workforce. Important industries includes textiles, mining and information technology.

Pakistan has a sound textile industry, as it is one of the major producers of cotton in the world. Textiles and apparel manufacturing contributes 51.4 percent of the country's total exports. The textile industry also employs 40 percent of the industrial workforce.

Information technology (IT) industry in Pakistan has been growing in recent years. This growth can be observed from the increase in software exports to foreign markets. The booming IT industry also sees a rise in the number of IT companies set up in the country. To date, there are 1306 IT companies in the estimated IT market of US$2.8 billion.
In 2010, services contributes 54.6 percent of Pakistan's total GDP, and employs 36.6 percent of the workforce. The government's initiative of the privatization of telecommunications, utilities and banking industry have brought about significant job growth opportunities in services.

Telecommunications plays an important role in the services of Pakistan. For the mobile phone market alone, the number of subscribers have multiplied exponentially since 2000, to reach over 100 million users, boasting one of the highest mobile densities in the world. Telecommunications is also the most attractive industry in Pakistan for foreign direct investment, amounting to over 9 billion since 2000.