16 May 2004	Sunday	25 Rabi-ul-Awwal 1425

ISLAMABAD: The government's role in improving the social sector through strong strategies is very critical because this is one of the major drivers of delivering better services to the people.

Finance minister Shaukat Aziz told Dawn that people in any country, including Pakistan, look towards the government for better education and health facilities for themselves and their children, better security, better programmes for women, effective population planning programme and several other social sector initiatives.

"In today's world, however, it is not the extent of money the government spends but the need for comprehensive strategies to be put out by the government."

In Pakistan's case, Mr Aziz said, the Poverty Reduction and Strategy Paper (PRSP) outlined a very comprehensive tribute to all the social sector policies, where expenditure on poverty reduction and social sector is increasing every year by about 20 per cent and the government is managing the entire social sector by judging the outcomes.

"We recognise that the government has to increase the allocated funds for these sectors, which we are doing but more important is improving the effectiveness of the expenditure because if you put more money in the leaky bucket, you don't get the required outcomes," he said.

He said the government had to make the process much more efficient and transparent and district and provincial governments, in addition to the federal government, have a major role to play in this. In fact, they have a much important role than the federal government in delivering effective social services to the people.

In Pakistan's case, the PRSP outlines targets we have set ourselves by outcomes. For instance, in literacy, we look at enrolment rates, the dropout rate, teacher absenteeism, etc. In health, we look at immunisation rate, number of lady health visitors, and indicators which show outcomes.

"What we are looking for is the ability to impact positively on the outcomes and we have seen progress in the country". On the population side, this year the growth rate is expected to be 1.94 per cent, down from over two per cent just two years ago. So trends are positive but the social indicators have to move much faster," the finance minister said.

"From this point, we also encourage the non-profit organizations(NPOs), non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and the philanthropy institute to fill the gap of social services." There are many NPOs offering free or subsidized medical care and education to several people. There are a lot of private hospitals and schools too and though not all, some have very high fees, but most ofthem are offering services at very subsidized rate. Such organizations have a larger presence in urban areas but are now entering into rural areas as well.

In Pakistan, there is a strong culture of philanthropy and people like to donate and this is filling an unmet need for medical services and education.

The government obviously is trying to provide basic health care and education to the entire population. However, the country has huge area and its population is widespread. "So here we need, like any other country in the world, to involve other social sector organizations and civil society to play their role."

This comes in the work of NGOs which have played a major role and their presence is increasing in health and education. Then comes the pure private role also, where some are profit making and some are not, but they are adding a lot in providing social services.

A number of organisations like National Rural Support Programme, Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund, Aga Khan Rural Support Programme and the Khushhali Bank who are doing a lot of work in Northern Areas and other rural areas of the country through community programmes and micro-credit.

They are taking in hand a number of drainage schemes, water supply, roads in the villages and providing micro-finance and undertaking community projects.

The finance minister said the best thing one can do in the social sector is to increase the incomes of the people through community projects and give them opportunities.