Centre, provinces agree to unite all social protection programmes

Islamabad

In the wake of 18th Constitutional Amendment, the centre, provinces and experts have agreed upon establishing a supra body at national level to ensure social protection by putting all programmes such BISP at national level and other initiatives at provincial levels under one umbrella.

All federating units have also agreed on adopting a national database registry of the vulnerable to be maintained by Nadra. 

This national database registry should be open to scrutiny for achieving transparency, having a well defined updating process by involving local governments so that updating remains sustainable, linking with social protection so that benefits accruing to specific households through multiple programmes could be tracked in order to avoid beneficiary enjoying multiple programmes at federal, provincial level or benefiting through some NGO as well. 

The concerned parties also agreed to establish an effective and strong monitoring, reporting and evaluation system. A management information system (MIS) based on integrated monitoring & evaluation (M&E) system for social protection would be an essential component of overall social protection arrangements.

The federal and provincial governments as well as experts working on poverty and social protection have also agreed on national social protection policy framework during an important meeting held by the Planning Commission.

According to official presentation given in this technical committee meeting, says that for institutional mechanism, it was suggested to create a new institution at national level or designate an existing one to take lead at federal level to consolidate, coordinate and mainstream social protection policies and programmes in the country. Along with developing its vertical and horizontal linkages at national, provincial and local levels, there is need for establishing institutional coordination to avoid overlapping. 

It further states that social protection in Pakistan come into limelight in the aftermath of 2005 earthquake but slowed down on economic front in 2007-8. Subsequently in the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP-II), the need for social protection was highlighted. 

Then federal and provincial government signed Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) for ensuring coordination on social protection but it was pointed out that there was no agreed definition of this important subject.

Finally, the social protection definition at federal level agreed upon stating that “social protection is the set of provisions in terms of policies, interventions, systems, benefits and guarantees that aim at ensuring a minimum and stable living standard for the poor and vulnerable as a right. It prioritises those most in need, enabling them to cope with the risks while building their capacity to participate and benefit from available opportunities to exit poverty, mitigate vulnerability or aim at preventing the vulnerable from falling into poverty”.

For the way forward, it was agreed by the provinces to develop area wise social protection policies for Sindh, Balochistan, AJK, ICT and Fata. It was also agreed that the federal and provincial governments will align social protection policies. All stakeholders evolved consensus for developing national framework for social protection based on commonalities of the provincial and area-wise social protection policies.

Planning Commission’s Member Social Sector Dr Naeem Zafar said on Thursday that the provinces asked for establishing supra body at national level to undertake initiative for social protection more effectively. In order to remove duplication of work, he said, the social protection framework was agreed upon among the centre and provinces so now fragmented approach would be overcome.