KARACHI: The Sindh government has planned to launch a special poverty reduction programme in the next budget as a part of Pakistan Peoples Party pledges made in its election manifesto.

This decision was taken by Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah while presiding over a meeting held here on Monday to finalise the ‘social protection strategy’ to be launched in the next budget.

The programme would focus on poverty reduction by providing social security cover to the marginalised section of the population such as the poorest of the poor and women. It would also cover certain other sectors, including family health, mother and child support programme, Benazir Hari Card, Benazir Women Agricultural Workers Programme, and Internship Guarantee Programme.

Speaking on the occasion, the chief minister said that PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari had directed him to launch social protection programmes as announced in the PPP election manifesto of 2019.

He also recalled that some of the poverty reduction programmes were already under implementation through different departments which would now be summed up in a single department so that proper focus could be made. In this connection the chief minister directed P&D chairperson Naheed Shah to establish a separate unit in her department.

The meeting, attended by CM adviser on information Murtaza Wahab, CM coordinator Haris Gazdar, P&D chairperson Naheed Shah, principal secretary to CM Sajid Jamal Abro, finance secretary Najam Shah and other officers concerned, discussed different proposals to reduce poverty, including ones for advancing small loans to youth and women to start their own businesses and return the loan in easy installments. Under this programme women would be empowered by engaging them in the agriculture sector in the rural areas by giving them seed and fertilisers. The youth would be given scholarships to continue their higher education. The meeting decided to firm up the proposals for approval by the appropriate forum before launching them.

In a separate meeting, the chief minister was told that 10 schemes of Rs13.5 billion were in progress against which Rs7.671 billion had been released.

Published in Dawn, May 28th, 2019