Pakistan’s Mobile Phone Imports Surge by Over 180% in Fiscal Year 2023-24

During the initial nine months of the fiscal year 2023-24 (July-March), Pakistan witnessed a remarkable surge in mobile phone imports, reaching $1.301 billion—a staggering growth of 181.26 percent compared to the same period in the previous fiscal year.

Data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) revealed a month-on-month decline of 4.87 percent in mobile phone imports in March 2024, standing at $153.051 million compared to $160.90 million in February 2024.

Despite the monthly dip, March 2024 saw a remarkable year-on-year growth of 930.92 percent in mobile phone imports, indicating a significant shift from $14.846 million in March 2023 to $153.051 million in March 2024.

Overall, telecom imports for July-March 2023-24 surged to $1.623 billion, marking a substantial growth of 117.90 percent compared to the same period in the previous fiscal year.

Read: Pakistan Witnesses 10-15% Drop in Mobile Phone Prices

Year-on-year basis data for March 2024 exhibited a growth of 422.58 percent in telecom imports, totaling $189.042 million compared to $36.175 million in March 2023.

However, on a month-on-month basis, overall telecom imports experienced a slight negative growth of 1.13 percent in March 2024, amounting to $191.201 million compared to February 2024.

The first two months of the calendar year 2024 (January-February) saw local manufacturing/assembling plants produce 6.1 million mobile handsets, while only 0.3 million were commercially imported, according to official data.

In February alone, local plants manufactured/assembled 3.83 million mobile handsets, with only 0.06 million imported commercially.

Read: Pakistan Manufactured Over 2.2 Million Mobile Phones in January 2024

Out of the total 6.1 million locally produced/assembled mobile handsets, 2.78 million were 2G phones and 3.35 million were smartphones, as per Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) data.

Despite challenges such as import restrictions on mobile phone accessories leading to limitations in opening letters of credit (LCs), commercial imports of mobile handsets surged during the same period.