Pakistani consumers have been protesting on the streets about soaring costs
Pakistan is at risk of bankruptcy as the global financial crisis bites into southern Asia.
Officials have been meeting representatives from the International Monetary Fund to ask for help with their balance of payments crisis, which has left the country with barely enough foreign currency to cover six weeks of imports.
Meanwhile inflation is at 25% and the government is having to borrow massively.
Barbara Plett in Islamabad explains the background to the current crisis, and the sense of collapse in Pakistan's cities:
Listen Listen to Barbara Plett (4 mins 01 secs)
Workers at Karachi's market told the BBC they are getting desperate:
Listen Listen to Karachi market workers (1 min 02 secs)
The fear is that Pakistan's budget and balance of payments are in such a mess that the country could default on its debt - which would make life for the workforce harder still.
However, officials insist this is unlikely - as Pakistan's High Commissioner in London, Wajid Shamsul Hassan spoke to the BBC's Stephen Sackur:
Listen Listen to Wajid Shamsul Hassan (1 min 47 secs)
And some better news for trade in the country has been the opening of a historic trade link across divided Kashmir for the first time in six decades. Delhi correspondent Chris Morris reported on the situation on the Indian side of the Line of Control:
Listen Listen to Chris Morris (3 mins 42 secs)
Meanwhile in Delhi itself, Jayati Ghosh, Professor of Economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, gave his view on the economic turbulence:
