KARACHI: Discussing food security and hunger in Sindh, experts at a workshop stressed the need to promote the role of women in the centre of the paradigm for better results in future strategies.

The Sindh planning and development ministry in collaboration with European Union’s PFM-SPP programme organised the one-day workshop on the topic of food security, hunger and nutrition in Sindh.

Haris Gazdar, director at the Collective for Social Science Research, was the guest speaker for the event. He gave an overview about food security, hunger and nutrition in Sindh.

He stressed that the existing policy framework was too narrowly focused on output and was preventing price volatility. He suggested that women should be placed at the centre of the policy paradigm.

He advised the provincial government to incorporate more nuanced understanding of linkages between hunger, food insecurity and nutrition and to use existing platforms to identify and break cycles of hunger and malnutrition.

Secretary (planning) Shereen Mustafa said the province had taken a lot of initiatives to reduce food insecurity, hunger, malnutrition and stunting yet a lot had to be done by all the stakeholders through concerted efforts. She said the workshop was the first step in that direction and in future more such workshops would be conducted with the collaboration of the European Union.

Natural Resources member Abdul Fattah Tunio pointed out that availability and accessibility were the two major issues pertaining to food security. Similarly, he informed the audience, the present government had formulated many important policies for each sector and Sindh growth strategy would also be unveiled soon.

Officials concluded the session with the commitment that all the participants would work with zeal in their respective departments and fields to attain all action points that were discussed in the workshop.

Those attending the workshop included Yukinori Hibi, head of provincial WFP office; Hasaan Khawar, policy specialist of PFM-SPP; Shahzadd Hassan, Team Lead EU PFM Project; Naeem-uz-Zafar, chief economist P&D; Mehtab-ul-Haque, member (infra/energy); Asghar Memon, chief of Foreign Aid.

Published in Dawn, February 15th, 2018