Daily Times

Minister for Planning Development and Special Initiatives Professor Ahsan Iqbal on Wednesday said that the government was ensuring to clearly define the key performance indicators (KPIs) of each social sector uplift projects.

He said that the government initiated these programs under its Public Sector Development Program to achieve desired results of sustainable socio-economic prosperity in the country. The absence of these key indicators would not only create hindrance in monitoring and evaluation of such projects, but also lead to failure of achieving the set objectives for which these were developed, he said while addressing a conference organized by Center for Economic Research in Pakistan (CERP). The event was organized with an aim to focus on improving decision-making through rigorous quantitative research, engaging with policy counterparts with real policy challenges and designing and advising on high impact reforms based on data.

The other objectives of the event was to deploy cutting edge pedagogy tailored for Pakistan and provide data insights to the private sector on the product and process design, besides improving decision-making through evidence-based research, survey, executive education and advisory services. The minister said that the monitoring and evaluation system also helps to observe the outcomes of a project and achieved results against the set targets, besides addressing the all the bottleneck on time by establishing an early warning system and avoiding any further loss. The monitoring and evaluation department was of the vital importance in any organization, besides making its investment more productive and efficient to achieve the set goals, he said adding that it is expected that the feedback would be included in project formulation.

Ahsan Iqbal said that it was also expected that the CERP will ensure through its monitoring and evaluation system that all the funds allocated for different social sector projects under PSDP were spent to achieve the objectives for which the resources were allocated.

He said that it was also expected that CERP would share its modern expertise of monitoring and evaluation with the development sector of Pakistan for maintaining transparency in social sector development projects, besides maximizing the value of investment in these projects.