Comment by Riaz Haq on January 23, 2021 at 8:27am

The project approved by the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) includes Rs45 billion for new healthcare facilities, Rs7 billion for national health surveillance, Rs13 billion water sanitation, hygiene as well as interventions in less developed areas, said Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives, Asad Umar.

https://gulfnews.com/world/asia/pakistan/pakistan-federal-governmen...



Besides the healthcare project, the economic body also approved several projects regarding infrastructural and human development, education and water resources worth around Rs209 billion.

Focus on heath amid pandemic
Pakistan is investing in stronger health systems after the coronavirus pandemic unveiled the shortcomings of the country’s health system. The government’s focus is on strengthening the health system and engaging communities to protect people from future health threats. Pakistan government has also allocated $250 million initial funds for the purchase of the COVID-19 vaccine and has announced to provide coronavirus vaccines free of charge to its citizens.

Universal health coverage
Prime Minister Imran Khan has vowed to improve healthcare spending and also announced universal health coverage for all citizens for the first time in Pakistan. The programme, first initiated in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in 2020, would soon be extended to other provinces. Under the universal health insurance programme, each family would be entitled to medical treatment of up to Rs1 million ($6,000) a year at over 250 government and private hospitals across Pakistan.

“The development of the Universal Health Coverage benefit Package of Pakistan and its implementation will become the cornerstone of health reforms across Pakistan” believes PM’s Special Assistant on Health Dr. Faisal Sultan.

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The government plans to establish 48 nutrition centres under its Ehsaas programme to overcome common health problems like stunting, underweight and overweight in children under five years of age, especially in under-developed and poor areas of the country.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1601030/48-nutrition-centres-to-be-set-up...

Under this programme, nutrition/health services and conditional cash transfers will be made available to mothers and children. In the beginning, these centres will be set up in 13 districts.

This was decided at a meeting of the Ehsaas Na­­shonuma (nutrition) Steer­ing Committee presided over by Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on So­­cial Protection and Poverty Alleviation Dr Sania Nishtar here on Monday.

The meeting was informed that the programme was being implemented in partnership with the World Food Programme and provincial governments. The participants of the meeting discussed issues related to coordination between the parties which will implement the programme and how to effectively address the issue of undergrowth and malnutrition in the country.


The meeting was infor­med that it is a three-year programme which delivers conditional cash transfers to vulnerable pregnant women, mothers and children under five and provide them specialised nutritious food, immunisations and health-awareness sessions.

Representatives from the federal and provincial ministries, Foreign Commonwealth and Deve­lopment Office, Wor­­­­­ld Bank, World Food Pro­gramme, Wor­ld Health Orga­nisation, Asian Develo­p­ment Bank and Unicef atten­ded the meeting. Nutri­tion under the Ehsaas progra­mme aims to support multi-sectoral stra­tegies through poor-friendly programmes by targeting mothers and children.

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 30, 2021 at 5:17pm

How Pakistan is Using Moringa Tree to Alleviate Malnutrition


https://www.voanews.com/episode/how-pakistan-using-moringa-tree-all...

As part of an ongoing project in Pakistan’s Sindh province, efforts are underway to integrate a uniquely nutritious and drought-resistant tree called Moringa, into the local diet to help alleviate malnutrition. Muhammad Saqib has details from Matiari in Sindh province in this report narrated by Bezhan Hamdard.

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Moringa contains many healthful compounds such as:

vitamin A
vitamin B1 (thiamine)
B2 (riboflavin)
B3 (niacin), B-6
folate and ascorbic acid (vitamin C)
calcium
potassium
iron
magnesium
phosphorus
zinc
It is also extremely low in fats and contains no harmful cholesterol.

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 30, 2021 at 5:23pm

Growing moringa to cure malnutrition in Sindh

https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/773297-growing-moringa-to-cure-mal...

Plant nursery managers in Sindh have started to understand the growing demand and importance of moringa (oleifera) tree, because of its nutritional and medicinal value.


Nursery managers collect moringa seeds from neighbourhood trees and also buy from the local markets. Hundreds of plants are readily available for sale at the nurseries to meet the rising demand from the locals.

Alisher Hajano, associated with the government's social forestry department, near the famous Mayani forest, Hyderabad said, “It is only recently that this tree got popularity at a larger scale.”

Each nursery at the highway grows as much as 10,000 to 50,000 plants of moringa for contributing to annual tree plantation drives. Many people mostly use leaves and pods as organic food.

Hajano receives a number of people from different areas demanding two-five kilogram of fresh leaves to cure some ailments. He doesn’t own mature trees himself, and procures the product from neighbouring villages.

Moringa leaves are dried by these people at room temperature, to later use for curing some diseases. “I know many entrepreneurs in the neighbouring villages, who sell moringa fresh and dried leaves, powder and roots, which they prepare at homes and farms. They also consume fresh and dried leaves, pods and roots themselves as an organic vegetable,” he said.

In the past, people preferred planting neem and other varieties of fruit trees at home and workplaces, but now they prefer moringa trees because of its various uses.

Moringa tree saplings are available at almost all private nurseries for Rs20-80 each, depending on size and health.

Various government and non-governmental organisations have taken initiatives to tackle malnutrition via community-based management of acute malnutrition (CMAM). However, very few long-term interventions have been noted that are linked to building the capacity of local communities, especially in the areas of cropping, plantations and livelihood mechanisms.

After realising the importance of moringa in eradicating malnutrition, many organisations have taken different steps to promote this magical tree on a larger scale, while also disbursing knowledge and awareness about its usage as food and for curing health problems.

A report of Sindh Agriculture University (SAU) Tandojam shows that they had initiated a project in Tharparkar district, to address the issue of malnutrition. The university had planted 5,000 moringa trees with 500 households, believing in its nutritious value for both humans and livestock.

Residents of Thar Desert, due to inherent structural poverty, poor socioeconomic indicators and limited livelihood options, suffer from chronic food insecurity. Moringa tree is considered the best substitute to provide necessary nutrition to children under five, and pregnant and lactating mothers.

The report said that 5,000 mature trees would be sufficient not only for the communities’ own consumption, but also for their livestock. Apart from this, parts of the tree could be used to treat various diseases.

Muhammad Siddiq, leading Rural Development Association (RDA) in Mithi, Tharparkar district claims to have planted 5,600 moringa saplings in different areas of the desert. Some plants cultivated in 2017, have now matured and people have access to fresh leaves and pods to use as vegetables.

“It is a fast growing tree and the desert area is suitable for its plantation. It has also been proved one of the best solutions to tackle malnutrition on a sustainable basis,” he said.

There are more species of moringa, but oleifera is said to be more effective with medicinal properties. The tree is highly rich in nutrients, which are required by children under the age of five and pregnant and lactating mothers.

Comment by Riaz Haq on February 12, 2021 at 10:29am

1. More than 4.5 million children are enrolled in Sindh's schools
2. 133,000 teachers have been appointed for 49,103 schools
3. In 26,260 schools, facility for drinking water is not available

https://www.geo.tv/latest/334312-more-than-10000-government-schools...


More than 10,000 government schools are nonfunctional in Sindh, the Reform and Support of the Sindh Education and Literacy Department has revealed in a report.

Titled "Profiting for Government Schools," the report shows data from 2018-19 and has been released after a gap of two years. According to the report, there are more than 4.5 million children enrolled in the province's schools.

The report says that 133,000 teachers have been appointed for 49,103 schools, out of which only 36,659 schools are functional.

In 26,260 schools, there is no facility for drinking water, while 19,469 are without washrooms' facility. The report further revealed that more than 31,000 schools do not have electricity.


Moreover, 21,00-plus schools do not have boundary walls, while over 47,000 schools are deprived of lab facilities, while as many as 36,000 do not have playgrounds.

It is pertinent to mention here that a chunk of schools, more than 47,000, do not have libraries in them — a necessary facility for students' grooming.

The report said that 2,812,000 male and 1,749,140 female students were enrolled in the schools.

As many as 2,91,9862 students are enrolled in primary, 185,047 in middle, 140,032 in elementary, 918,706 in secondary, and 397,493 in higher secondary schools.

Meanwhile, out of the total 49,103 school buildings in the province, 14,998 are considered to be in satisfactory conditions, 8,426 are weary, while 14,977 need repairs.

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25.2pc of revenue to be spent on education, says Murad

While presenting Sindh’s education budget for the fiscal year 2020-21 on Wednesday, Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah said that the budget of education sector, in a macro perspective, had been increased to Rs244.5 billion when compared with Rs212.4bn for 2019-20.

“Despite resource constraints we have allocated funds which is 25.2 per cent of our current revenue budget,” he said.

He said that education was one of the key priority areas for the government of Sindh. “We aim at improving access to equitable, inclusive and quality education for all to realise their fullest potential and contribute to the development of society and economy, thus creating a sense of nationhood, inculcating values of tolerance, social justice and democracy in students,” he said.

He explained that in order to manage education-related functions in an efficient manner, enhance the quality of education and provide better facilities at educational institutions, the department of education was divided into two departments — the school education and literacy department (SELD) and the college education department (CED) back in 2016.

Comment by Riaz Haq on March 9, 2021 at 10:32am

To provide survivor-centered care, health workers in Pakistan learn to ask about gender-based violence with empathy

https://www.who.int/news-room/feature-stories/detail/to-provide-sur...

Early in her career, Dr Rukhsana Bashir, a clinician in Pakistan, was used to seeing women in her clinic with symptoms of pain, headaches, insomnia and depression. She would listen and treat each symptom, but the underlying causes went unnoticed.

She did not know that some of those women were experiencing gender-based violence (GBV) – a pervasive health challenge throughout the country and world, and one she personally had experienced.

Approximately, 34% of ever married women in Pakistan have experienced spousal violence, either physical, sexual or emotional, in their lifetime, with rates increasing as high as 52% in Khyber Paktunkhwa Province.

“It never came to my mind that these women might be experiencing gender-based violence,” says Dr Bashir, who works at the Family Planning Association of Pakistan’s Family Health Hospital in the city of Lahore.

Now years later, Dr Bashir has been trained by WHO to use its clinical and policy guidelines: Responding to intimate partner violence and sexual violence against women. She further trains health workers how to provide survivor-centered care including how to ask about violence and how to provide first-line support.

Dr Bashir is one of more than 1000 doctors, nurses, hospital administrators and community health workers, including midwives who were trained between 2018-2020 as part of the roll out of the clinical and policy guideline package by Pakistan’s Ministry of National Health Services Regulation and Coordination and provincial health departments, with technical support from WHO and sister UN agencies, to strengthen the country’s health systems response to gender-based violence.

Thanks to the training she received, Dr Bashir has changed her practice. Unexplained symptoms of chronic pain or headaches, insomnia or depression, lead her to ask more questions to women about potential violence at home.

“When women come to the clinic, they don’t think that they are going to discuss the problem [of violence], but I have to ask them a few bold questions. In the beginning they are afraid and don’t want to tell me anything, but you have to identify their problems. Only then can you offer better services and treatment.”

A decade long effort to support survivors
The training Dr Bashir completed is part of a decade long effort WHO’s Pakistan office to work with the Government to strengthen the health and multisectoral response to gender-based violence. However, in order to strengthen the health sector response, the country needed manuals, job aids and trainings for health workers. In 2010 there were none.

In response, the Government developed a national protocol for medico-legal care for gender-based violence survivors in 2011. This was accompanied by ongoing policy dialogues and advocacy to strengthen health sector response to gender-based violence.

In 2017, the WHO clinical handbook: Health care for women subjected to intimate partner violence or sexual violence, was adapted and piloted in selected provinces and districts. The adaptation process, led by the Government and WHO, included multiple stakeholders, such as provincial ministries of health, UN Women, UNFPA, non-governmental organizations, medical associations and health workers.

As a result, the Pakistani clinical handbook for health workers on the management of sexual and gender-based violence, and localized job aids and materials for training providers were produced. The Government and WHO conducted 30 trainings for master trainers, health workers, and medico-legal experts in four provinces.

Comment by Riaz Haq on March 11, 2021 at 8:58am

#Pakistan PM #ImranKhan launches initiative to feed the hungry. Free meals will be provided through Ehsaas Food Trucks at designated delivery points to people in need, especially those at risk of or experiencing #hunger. #poverty #malnutrition #Covid19

https://nation.com.pk/11-Mar-2021/pm-imran-khan-launches-initiative...

Prime Minister Imran Khan on Wednesday formally launched ‘Ehsaas Koi Bhuka Na Soye’ (No One Sleeps Hungry) initiative at a ceremony held here.

Addressing the launching ceremony, the Prime Minister regretted that there were many areas in Pakistan where people go to bed hungry.

“Most people in Pakistan are on daily wages and when they don’t get their wages, they have to sleep empty stomach,” he added.

He said that the government is starting the programme in Islamabad at the moment but it would soon reach other cities as well. “One day, these vans would feed people in entire Pakistan.”

As per the programme, cooked meals will be provided through mobile trucks at designated delivery points to people in need especially those at risk of or experiencing hunger.


Initially, the Ehsaas Food Trucks are being operated in Islamabad and Rawalpindi and at later stage this programme will be further expanded to other parts of the country.

Prime Minister Imran Khan said the programme is a step towards a welfare state, which always cares for its poor and deserving people.

He said he always feels happy to see that deserving people are given shelter and food with honour and dignity at various Panahgahs established across the country.

He also announced to launch a subsidy programme by June this year under which money will directly be transferred to the accounts of 30 million families.

He said it will enable the poor and deserving people to procure kitchen items.

It was his dream to extend the ‘Koi Bhuka Na Soye’ programme to the whole country and “Insha Allah we will do it”, he added.


Imran Khan said a large number of philanthropists in the country desired to participate in such programmes, and he believed that the success of pilot project in the twin cities would help win their trust to contribute towards its extension across Pakistan.

He also mentioned with pride the government’s health card scheme in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhawa and Gilgit Baltistan, under which each family was entitled for medical treatment worth Rs one million from any public or private hospital.

The prime minister, in a briefing on the occasion, was informed that after extensive deliberations on different avenues, the Pakistan Bait-ul-Mal (PBM) initiated the Meals on Wheels programme to tackle the extended demands of Panahgaahs.

Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Social Protection Dr Sania Nishtar said the programme was aimed at providing two time hygienic packed food – lunch and dinner – to the needy individuals through real time mobile kitchens in urban and rural areas of Islamabad. The project would be later scaled up to other areas of the country.

PBM Managing Director Aon Abbas, in his briefing, said at present two Ehsaas food trucks were serving free quality cooked food at various points across the twin cities of Rawalpindi and Islamabad, including hospitals, bus stations and other public places with utmost dignity. The meals were cooked, stored and distributed from the truck kitchen.

As per estimates, each food truck would feed two meals to around 2,000 people daily, and would target those, who could not reach the Panahgaahs for food.

The programme had been designed in a public private partnership mode whereby the PBM would be responsible for the operations of food trucks and Saylani Welfare International Trust would be responsible for the provision of meals.

The Pakistan Bait-ul-Mal had already been working on the component of Panahgaahs to provide food and shelter to the extremely poor and needy.It had so far established 15 Panahgaahs in different provinces.

Comment by Riaz Haq on March 26, 2021 at 1:55pm

#Pakistan to get $1.3 billion #WorldBank loan for social safety net (#EhsaasKafaalat), #infrastructure & governance. Projects include 35 small rainwater-fed #groundwater recharge #dams in #Sindh: #Karachi, Jamshoro, Thatta, Dadu, & Tharparkar. #water
https://www.geo.tv/latest/341738-pakistan-strikes-13-billion-develo...


Pakistan has reached an agreement with World Bank to work on seven projects worth $1.3 billion aimed at improving social protection, infrastructure, and governance, a statement from the Ministry of Economic Affairs said Friday.

Minister for Economic Affairs, Makhdum Khusro Bakhtyar witnessed the signing ceremony of seven project agreements at the Ministry of Economic Affairs.

"This financing will support the government’s initiatives in Social Protection, Disaster and Climate Risk Management, Improving Infrastructure for Resilience, Agriculture and Food Security, Human Capital Development and Governance Sectors," the statement said.

The agreement includes the Crisis-Resilient Social Protection Programme (CRISP) worth $600 million. The objective of the programme is to support the development of a more adaptive social protection system that will contribute to future crisis-resilience among poor and vulnerable households in the country.

"The programme is focused on the key initiatives being undertaken by Benazir Income Support Program (BISP) under the Ehaas Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programmes," the statement said.

The second project worth $200 million is the Locust Emergency and Food Security Project that will introduce a set of customised activities — such as conducting locust surveillance and controlling operations, rehabilitating livelihoods of affected rural communities and farmers — to effectively address the desert locust outbreak.

The third project worth $200 million is the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Human Capital Investment Project.

It aims to improve the availability, utilisation, and quality of primary healthcare services and elementary education services in four districts — Peshawar, Nowshera Haripur, and Swabi — of KP that have been hosting refugees.

The Sindh Resilience Project worth $200 Million — the fourth project — is to mitigate flood and drought risks in selected areas and strengthen Sindh’s capacity to manage natural disasters and public health emergencies.

"The project will support the establishment of the Sindh Emergency Service, including the development of six divisional headquarters operational facilities, provision of equipment, and training of personnel," it said.

It will also support the construction of 35 small rainwater-fed recharge dams in drought-prone regions of Sindh including Karachi, Jamshoro, Thatta, Dadu, and Nagarparker in Tharparkar districts.

The fifth project and sixth projects, Balochistan Livelihood and Entrepreneurship, and Balochistan Human Capital Investment Projects, worth $86 million aim to promote employment opportunities for rural communities; achieve sustainability of enterprises, and improve utilisation of quality health and education services in the province.

The final and seventh project, the Supporting Institutional Interventions for Management of Refugees Project, worth $50 million, aims to improve organisational and institutional capacity for managing refugees and host communities.

Secretary Ministry of Economic Affairs Noor Ahmed signed the financing agreements on behalf of the federal government, while representatives of Sindh, KP, and Balochistan signed their respective project agreements online.

World Bank's Country Director Najy Benhassine signed the agreements on behalf of the World Bank. The country director assured his institution's continuous financial and technical support to Pakistan in a bid to promote inclusive and sustainable economic growth in the country.

Comment by Riaz Haq on March 27, 2021 at 1:14pm

World Bank Supports Expansion of the Ehsass Social Protection Program in Pakistan to Increase Household Resilience to Economic Shocks


https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2021/03/25/pakistan...


The World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors today approved $600 million in financing from the International Development Association (IDA) for the Crisis-Resilient Social Protection Program (CRISP) that will support Pakistan to expand Ehsaas, the national poverty alleviation program, to protect vulnerable households and increase resilience to economic shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, millions of families across Pakistan face economic hardship, particularly those working in the informal sector, who have no savings or are not covered by existing social safety net programs,” said Najy Benhassine, World Bank Country Director for Pakistan. “This investment supports Ehsaas in developing an adaptive social protection system that is more efficient and offers a new model for crisis-response and increasing household resilience to future shocks.”

CRISP will facilitate the gradual expansion of Ehsaas social protection programs to better reach informal workers through an innovative, hybrid approach that blends social assistance with promotion of increased savings that informal workers, particularly women, can depend on in the event of economic shocks. It will provide a platform through which the government can rapidly respond to support the most affected households during an economic crisis.

“In the event of a crisis, a more flexible and dynamic social protection system can significantly reduce the time needed to respond to peoples’ needs as well as supporting a faster recovery,” said Amjad Zafar Khan, Task Team Leader for the Crisis-Resilient Social Protection program.

CRISP will also improve the capacity of the social registry to maintain up-to-date accurate household data and exchange data among social programs, while providing greater beneficiary choice in the biometric payment systems. It will also help Pakistan address longer-term impacts on human capital caused by the pandemic, resulting from foregone health and medical services and a substantial loss of education due to prolonged absence from schools.

To help prevent losses in human capital accumulation, which is critical to long-term resilience, CRISP leverages two existing Ehsaas programs that provide conditional cash transfers (CCT) to eligible households. These include Waseela-e-Taleem, a CCT program linked to primary school attendance and Nashonuma, a nutrition-focused CCT program aimed at improving child and maternal health, which will benefit more than three million families across the country.

The World Bank in Pakistan

Pakistan has been a member of the World Bank since 1950. Since then, the World Bank has provided $40 billion in assistance. The World Bank’s program in Pakistan is governed by the Country Partnership Strategy for FY2015-2020 with four priority areas of engagement: energy, private sector development, inclusion, and service delivery. The current portfolio has 57 projects and a total commitment of $13 billion.

Comment by Riaz Haq on May 15, 2021 at 6:26pm

#WorldBank recognizes #Pakistan's #EhsaasEmergencyCash among world's largest. Pakistan is among top 5 lower middle income nations by level of #social protection spending. #Mongolia (8% of #GDP), #Zimbabwe (5%), #Bolivia (3%), #Pakistan (1.2%), Others <1% https://www.brecorder.com/news/40092285

As per World Bank’s latest report titled Social Protection and Jobs Responses to COVID-19: A Real-Time Review of Country Measures, India’s Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) program with over 206 million individuals covered, is the largest Covid-related cash transfer scheme worldwide. Such program is followed by three cash transfer interventions all reaching over a hundred million people, namely the US first stimulus check (160 million), Japan’s one-off universal program reaching about (116.5), and Pakistan’s Ehsaas (100.9).

The report stated that Pakistan was also among the top 5 lower-middle-income countries by level of social protection spending. The highest level of spending in lower-middle-income countries is observed in Mongolia (8% of GDP), Zimbabwe (5%), Bolivia (3%), Pakistan (1.2%), and with a range of others spending 1% of GDP.

As per the report, Pakistan’s provincial governments also implemented supportive fiscal measures from the onset of the shock, including cash grants to low-income households, tax relief, and additional health spending (including a salary increase for healthcare workers).

The government of Punjab implemented a PKR 10 billion cash grants program. The government of Sindh's measures included a cash grant.

The Government of Pakistan allocated Rs. 203 Billion (USD 1.23bn) to deliver one-time emergency cash assistance to 15 million families at risk of extreme poverty. This represents nearly 109 million people. Each family receives Rs. 12,000 (USD 75) for immediate subsistence.

The Economic Coordination Committee approved Rs. 75 billion among 6.2 million daily-wage earners with cash assistance for the daily wagers working in the formal industrial sector and who had been laid off because of the COVID-19 outbreak. It was part of the PM’s Relief Package of Rs 200 billion.

As part of the supportive fiscal measures, the Government of Pakistan implemented additional health spending. The government of Sindh's measures included a cash grant and ration distribution program of PKR 1.5 billion for low-income households.

The report stated that a relief package worth PKR 1.2 trillion was announced by the federal government on March 24, which has been almost fully implemented. The economic package earmarked resources for accelerated procurement of wheat (PKR 280 billion), financial support to utility stores (PKR 50 billion), a reduction in regulated fuel prices (with a benefit for end-consumers estimated at PKR 70 billion), support for health and food supplies (PKR 15 billion), electricity bill payments relief (PKR 110 billion.

The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet in April last year approved the deferment of monthly and quarterly fuel adjustments in the electricity bills for power consumers for the next three months (till June 2020) under the government relief package. 06 April 2020 Power Division has reportedly prepared power tariff freezing for three months aimed at minimizing the financial burden on the Coronavirus-hit consumers, estimated financial impact of which will be Rs 381 billion, stated the report.

Comment by Riaz Haq on May 17, 2021 at 8:30am

Is Covid-19 a turning point in social protection?

https://nation.com.pk/17-May-2021/is-covid-19-a-turning-point-in-so...


A number of social protection interventions, monetary interventions such as a cut in policy rate by the central bank, and flexible credit facilities were introduced by the government. Most notably, it introduced the Ehsaas Emergency Cash (EEC) programme, covering 5 million existing Ehsaas Kafaalat beneficiaries and new temporary beneficiaries who were either uncovered or ineligible before the pandemic. Identified through an SMS campaign, many of the new beneficiaries are daily labourers and informal workers whose livelihoods have been adversely affected by the corona-induced economic downturn. An immediate cash relief of Rs.12,000 was extended by the government to these families. Moreover, the Prime Minister launched a web-portal soliciting applications from those who have lost their jobs as a result of the pandemic and committed the Prime Minister’s Covid Pandemic Relief Fund to those qualifying for aid. These funds are being disbursed through the EEC programme.

When analysing the shock responsive social protection pathways, the following points are important to consider. Pakistan already has a social safety net in place which targets the poorest quintile of the population. Therefore, it might have been ideal to expand on the already existing cash transfer programmes. In that instance, a lot of people, including daily wage labourers, who have been adversely impacted by this pandemic crisis but weren’t part of any existing social safety net might have missed out. Hence, it was imperative to reach out to people who were not part of such safety nets, but desperately needed support.

In such a scenario, one option was to give out a one-time universal payment, such as in developed countries, but that means some of the money would have gone out to the undeserving people as well. Keeping in view the limited resources, this wasn’t a viable option and the approach of targeted support was better suited. Hence, the EEC programme that leveraged on the existing Ehsaas infrastructure was launched and it has effectively targeted the vulnerable segment of the society.


Fortunately, over the past decade, Pakistan has developed asocial safety net structure which provided a foundation to expand upon and deliver shock responsive aid efficiently in form of the Ehsaas Emergency Cash Programme. However, this piggyback model through which the existing systems of Ehsaas are being utilised is a short-term intervention. Though helpful, it doesn’t cover broader aspects of social protection such as enabling the poor to graduate out of poverty. This will be a critical factor in offsetting the adverse impact of the pandemic in the long run.

A strong sustainable social protection system guides the beneficiaries towards self-sufficiency and enables them to earn their own livelihoods, addressing inequality as a result, ensuring social inclusion and empowering the vulnerable. During the pandemic cinduced joblessness, it is essential that the social protection framework sprioritise the vulnerable, provide access to health services, support people in adopting necessary prevention measures, ensure income security, protect human capabilities and livelihoods, scale up and strengthen already existing social protection programmes and its delivery capacities and design crisis response measures with a view to strengthen social protection systems in the long term.

Pakistan highly values its relations with EU: COAS Bajwa
The Ehsaas programme has done well but the harsh reality is that there is a need to improve the existing social protection mechanism, build state capabilities, make shock responsive social protection a permanent feature and transition to a broader comprehensive scale of welfare for a better, inclusive and sustainable future. Hopefully, the Covid-19 pandemic would turn out to be a turning point in the social protection domain in Pakistan.

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