PM greets Sania, Ehsaas team after WB acknowledgement

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan Sunday congratulated Senator Sania Nishtar, who is Special Assistant to PM on Social Protection and Poverty Alleviation, and the Ehsaas team for achieving a milestone among states spending on social protection plans.

He tweeted to extend congratulations to Sania and the Ehsaas team and posted a news report in this connection in which the World Bank (WB) has listed Ehsaas Programme among world’s four top social protection plans.

According to the report, Pakistan is also among top 5 lower middle income countries by level of social protection spending. The WB has listed Ehsaas Emergency Cash among top four social protection interventions globally in terms of number of people covered.

In this regard, the WB released a report on global social protection responses to COVID-19 Saturday. This report is called the ‘living paper’ and it is a partnership effort involving 18 co-authors and a large number of contributors; the paper presents a 650-page volume and accompanying database documenting how countries and territories are planning, implementing or completing social protection measures in the context of the pandemic.

The report states that there has been an exponential growth in social protection measures between March 20, 2020 and May 14, 2021 and that a total of 3,333 social protection measures have been planned or implemented in 222 countries or territories.

“Pakistan ranks fourth globally in terms of the number of people covered and 3rd globally in terms of percentage of population covered amongst those that covered over 100 million people; the WB has stated that only select countries have attained impressive six-digit levels in this regard. Pakistan’s Ehsaas Emergency Cash is one of them,” says the report.