LAHORE, Sept 17: Participants in a dialogue on public-private partnership on Saturday emphasized the need for creating awareness among the stakeholders so that the idea could be fully utilized to develop society and consequently reduce poverty.

The dialogue was organized by an Islamabad-based NGO in collaboration with the Punjab Irrigation and Drainage Authority (PIDA) at a local hotel.

The panelists included Federal Education Minister's Advisor Baela Jamil, Irrigation department representative Israrul Haq and representatives of some NGOs. They narrated their own success stories with the public-private partnership concept.

They recommended change in the mindset of the stakeholders - government, people and corporate sector, clarification of their role, and effective supervision and management of projects to be run under the concept. Creation of an enabling environment through a change in the official rules was also proposed.

They said the main hurdles in the way of the partnership were the government resistance, attitude of the corporate sector to only mint money and avoid taking interest in social sector development, and the less good work of some of the NGOs. "The NGOs must win the confidence of the government for promoting the concept," they recommended.

Ms Baela Jamil said the concept was not new in the education sector. People had given land for schools and, in ancient times, used to get together for education. Now the concept was being followed in an organized manner.

She said people started taking part in the education process after they felt that the government-run schools were not providing the required services. The government, too, felt the same and allowed the public-private partnership in running its schools so as to improve services.

She said the success stories of the concept in small cities and towns needed to be replicated on a larger scale.

Israrul Haq mentioned the public-partnership experience conducted by PIDA by making an area water board and farmer organizations over 300 canals in the province, claiming it had helped reduce the incidence of water theft, besides resolution of disputes between farmers at the local level.

The head of an NGO, which collects and re-cycles garbage, said his work was a success because he was giving money to the people working on the project. He was even paying the tehsil administrations that were providing land and other facilities to the NGO for stocking and re-cycling the solid waste.

According to Azhar Saeed, the public-private partnership could be used for alleviating poverty, which was on the priority list of the government but increasing due to various reasons.