Traditionally, five year plans suggest an indicative set of policies to achieve medium-term targets. Operarionalisation of these policies, however, takes place through annual plans and budgets, formulation of trade and monetary policies and fiscal measures deemed necessary and announced during the course of a year, the so-called mini-budgets. In recent years, while five year plans have increasingly been seen as analytical frameworks for consistency rather than tight blueprints for disciline, there have been demands, especially from the private sector, that economic policies should be announced for a medium term. Underlying this shift of emphasis are the profound changes that have occurred in economic organisation and management in the country as well as the broad sweep of the forces of rapid globalisation. Of the total fixed investment in Pakistan today, over 60 per cent originates in the private sector. Only a decade ago, the private sector share was well below 50 per cent. Similarly, foreign investment used to be an insignificant component of foreign inflows. It stood at over a billion dollars for three years in a row in the nineties. The degree of openness of the economy has also increased significantly. Exports and imports alone constitute one-third of the GDP. The impact of liberalised financial flows is in addition.