ISLAMABAD: Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb has underscored the importance of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to Pakistan’s economy — contributing around 40 per cent to GDP, 25pc to exports and nearly 78pc of non-agricultural employment — while noting that their access to formal finance remains disproportionately low, with only a small share of private-sector lending directed towards them.

The minister stated this while participating in a high-level panel discussion titled ‘Scaling up SME Finance’ hosted at the International Business Forum, held on the sidelines of the

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