March 15, 2007	Thursday	Safar 25, 1428

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PESHAWAR, March 14: The NWFP government is planning to allocate approximately Rs293 million for various projects for social protection in the fiscal year 2007-08. This was stated by NWFP special secretary for finance Aurangzeb Haq at a three-day workshop, which began here on Wednesday.

The NWFP planning and development department in collaboration with the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) is organising the workshop on action plan of the province for implementing a social protection strategy devised by the federal government.

Mr Haq said the provincial government considered social welfare as a priority area and in the current fiscal year, Rs247.433 million had been allocated for various projects in the sector. The projects included one worth Rs3 million for monthly stipend for senior citizens launched in three pilot districts, Rs36 million for a similar package for educated unemployed youth and Rs6.867 million for children’s home.

Similarly, Rs200 million has been allocated for the newly-established Organisation for Indigent and Dispossessed and Rs1.565 million for children’s welfare homes.

He said the NWFP, being a deficit province, could not make significant increases in budgetary allocation for social protection programmes, but the government was committed to double funding for such projects in the coming year.

Earlier, while opening the workshop, NWFP additional chief secretary Ghulam Dastgeer said creating an economically just society was a big challenge in the modern age.

He said the NWFP derived 90 per cent resources from the federal government and had the highest level of poverty among the federating units.

He described the fragile private sector, limited industrial base, inadequate financial resources and lack of employment opportunities as factors making the lives of the poor and vulnerable difficult.

Mr Dastgeer said the NWFP government was trying to provide maximum relief to the poor through various programmes. He hoped that the deliberation in the workshop would enable the provincial government to improve the sector.

The federal government has devised a National Social Protection Strategy (NSPS) which will be implemented in coordination with provincial governments.

The main objectives of the three-day workshop are supporting implementation of the NSPS at the provincial level, providing technical support to stakeholders and producing an action plan to feed into the province’s Annual Development Programme.