July 15, 2008	Tuesday	Rajab 11, 1429

ISLAMABAD, July 14: China has invited Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund (PPAF) to share its expertise on conceptualisation and institutionalisation of broad reconstruction strategy in earthquake-ravaged provinces of Sichuan, Gansu and Shaanxi.

The State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development of China and Department for International Development (DFID) are jointly organising an experts workshop on International Planning for Reconstruction and Response to Disaster on July 15, 2008 in Beijing.

Chief Operating Officer and Team Leader Reconstruction and Rehabilitation, PPAF, Kamran Akbar has been especially invited to share PPAF’s invaluable experience in reconstruction strategies which it applied in earthquake-hit areas of Azad Kashmir and the NWFP to normalise lives of affected persons in the wake of October 8, 2005 earthquake in Pakistan.

PPAF has been bestowed with this unique honour due to its quality control and adherence to compliance guidelines in the earthquake-hit areas which has started earning the Fund international credibility, says a press release here on Monday.

The computer-based monitoring system developed by PPAF for reconstruction and rehabilitation also ensures transparency and accountability, it said.

The State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development of China has also set up a post earthquake reconstruction working group to take charge of the village level post-quake reconstruction planning in Sichuan, Gansu and Shaanxi provinces. Under the framework of this working group, the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development of China, with the support of DFID, will implement a project to enhance the capacity of people for poverty alleviation in earthquake-affected rural areas, the press release added.

Besides PPAF, experts have been invited from Indian government’s Disaster Management Office, Graduate School of Global Environmental Studies in Kyoto University, Japan, and from international non-governmental organisations with experience in dealing with disasters in quake-hit areas around the globe.

The objective of the workshop is to inform planning of reconstruction work in poor villages in the abovementioned provinces to be carried out by the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development of China in coordination with the line agencies.

The workshop would help strategise framework for planning, facilitate assessment of the impact of earthquake on the poor, prepare participatory and community development plans, improvement in safety, capacity-building, mobilisation of experts, policy research and monitoring.

The PPAF has partnered with 72 organisations working in 33,500 villages with more than 100,000 communities in 117 districts across the country.