"If the international donor community could have come up with a significant contribution to the relief fund of the President.... the burden on the government would have been manageable," Dr Ishrat Husain told Reuters in an interview late on Monday.
But speaking on the sidelines of an Islamic Financial Services Forum, Husain said the aid response had "not been so great".
United Nations officials in Islamabad said Pakistan had received pledges totalling $1.4 billion in all forms of aid since the earthquake, but only $380 million had been received.
Husain said the private sector and non-governmental organisations would sponsor reconstruction activities in some affected villages.
"But we still believe the government will still have to provide the majority of the outlay. The estimates are $5-$10 billion. There is a donor conference scheduled for November 19 in Islamabad," he said.
Although government finances are straining after the earthquake, economic growth should not be hard hit, Husain said.
"GDP growth will not be affected for the simple reason that the area which has been affected does not contribute much either to agriculture, or to industry, or to services. The only indirect impact which can take place on GDP growth is on fiscal policy."
Gross domestic product is expected to grow by 7 percent in the current fiscal year and for two more years after that, Husain said, while inflation will drop from 8 percent this fiscal year to 6 percent and then 5 percent.
The central bank's latest official forecast in its annual report released on October 29 is for economic growth of between 6.3 and 6.8 percent in the fiscal year to June 2006.
Husain, who leaves office on December 1, is hopeful that foreign direct investment in Pakistan will continue to grow despite what he called a "bad image problem" stemming from its geographical position in a dangerous region, with troubled borders with Afghanistan and India.
He highlighted the expectation that foreign direct investment would reach $2 billion in the 2005-06 fiscal year ending next June, up from $1.5 billion last year.
"It was $300 million when (President Pervez) Musharraf took over (in 1999)," he said.
"So it is a tremendous satisfaction that we got the country out from rock bottom. I would still like to see that there is more sympathy and more investment coming in from outside."
Annual inflation in September was 8.53 percent. The rate has fallen in recent months and Husain noted that high oil prices and acute food shortages had contributed to inflation rates in the past year of double what they were in the previous four or five.
After he leaves the central bank, Husain hopes to continue to have a role in the economy. "I'd like to start a policy think-tank in Pakistan. You must have a second opinion on public policies; it should not be exclusive to the government," he added.