Pakistan Debates High PTA Mobile Phone Taxes
November 16, 2025
Governor Jameel Ahmad urged Pakistani banks to adopt AI, climate financing, and increase SME lending at the Pakistan Banking Summit 2025. SBP’s Strategic Vision 2028 aims to boost financial inclusion from 64% to 75% by 2028.
Read more: SBP Mandates Digital Onboarding for Pakistani SMEs
State Bank of Pakistan Governor Jameel Ahmad called on financial institutions to revolutionize their operations at the Pakistan Banking Summit 2025, emphasizing artificial intelligence adoption, climate-resilient financing, and SME lending. Ahmad criticized banks for allocating 74% of loans to established corporates while only 5% reaches SMEs, urging them to rethink their business models.
He highlighted SBP’s Strategic Vision 2028, which aims to increase bank account coverage from 64% to 75% of adults and reduce the gender gap from 34% to 25% by 2028 under the National Financial Inclusion Strategy 2024-2028. The governor stressed using AI with cellular and satellite data to enhance financial services for agriculture, SMEs, and women.
He also called for digitalizing payment systems across public and private sectors and developing climate risk assessment capabilities across credit, market, liquidity, and operational risks, warning that ignoring climate issues would have severe economic consequences.
