KARACHI: Representatives of the business community have asked the government to give details about millions of rupees being collected each year on account of Workers’ Profit Participation Fund (WPPF).
The fund is aimed at developing welfare projects like schools, housing colonies and health centres for business and industrial workers.
Drawing attention towards the plight of workers, industry leaders urged the federal and provincial governments to investigate into unaccounted funds of the WPPF which could have improved the lives of workers if used properly.
The WPPF was established in late sixties to acknowledge the participation of a worker towards making their company profitable and to share with them a portion of those profits as a reward and incentive for enhancing productivity.
According to the Companies Profits (Workers’ Participation) Act of 1968, business entities contribute 5pc of their pre-tax profits yearly to the fund to give social cover to workers drawing minimum wages. There are more than 67,000 registered companies in Pakistan.
However, the act also limits the amount that can be given to an individual worker at 25pc and around 75pc goes to the government to be utilised for welfare projects for workers, said Lasbela Chamber of Commerce and Industry President Ismail Suttar.
Shabir Ahmed, chairman of Pakistan Bedwear Exporters Association (PBEA), said that even Pakistan Economic Survey of the previous fiscal year failed to disclose the amount collected under the head of WPPF. Consequently, the major portion of the fund that ends up with the government has not yielded any satisfactory results.
All this is going on as nearly 39pc of Pakistanis live in poverty and the gap in availability and utilisation of resources between the affluent and the poor is widening day by day, he said.—Staff Reporter
“The business and industry has the right to question where the fund is going, who benefits from it and why it has been left unchecked for so long that hardly anybody even questions about it,” he said.
Published in Dawn October 25th, 2016