KARACHI: Sindh government approved Rs 4 billion (bn) for People Poverty Reduction Programme (PPRP) in six districts during a meeting on Friday. As per details, a similar program is already being run in ten districts. Presiding over a meeting, Sindh Chief Minister (CM) Murad Ali Shah said that the provincial government had already launched a union council (UC) based Poverty Reduction Program of Rs 3.36 bn in order to reduce poverty, improve quality of life of poor and marginalised communities through social mobilisation, capacity development, asset creation and income generation. Approving PPRP, Chief Minister said that programme was being launched in 288 UCs of six districts of province. The districts include Ghotki, Sukkur, Naushehroferoze, Benazirabad and rural UCs of Karachi and Hyderabad. He said that with the implementation of this initiative, provincial government’s intervention for poverty reduction would amount to an investment of Rs14.2 bn. “This would definitely develop a good impact in rural areas,” he maintained. He said that UC based PRP was a symbol of performance of Sindh government in terms of service delivery to poorest rural population through social mobilisation to empower local communities by enabling them to improve their livelihood and increase their earnings through Income Generating Grants (IGG) and Community Fund which were being offered as interest free loan grants under the program. CM termed UC based PRP a unique initiative. He said that it focused on women empowerment and livelihood of poorest households which were identified through a scientific survey. He pointed out that the programme was the first ever major project taken up by the provincial government which required community participation for its implementation. Murad Ali Shah explained that a hallmark of the programme was development through social mobilisation which provided a great opportunity to skilled women based in rural areas. CM Murad said that the programme would encourage such women to produce and showcase their products by tapping into larger markets based in megacities like Karachi. He said that this was the first time these women had an opportunity to present and sell their products without the intervention of a middleman. “This gives them confidence in their ability and exposes them to the market. In addition, it also enables them to become economically better off and financially independents,” he added. CM Shah said that the programme did not just focus on the overall improvement of social sector by directly addressing indicators of health, poverty, environment, social security, shelter, employment and basic livelihood but it also helped in achieving the cardinal targets set under the universally accepted Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), of which Pakistan was a signatory. CM Murad informed the meeting that the programme was initially launched in and Kashmore Kandhkot districts on pilot basis in 2009 for a period of 30 months. He said that it achieved desired objectives of organising households in community and village organisations by providing rural communities a common platform to discuss and resolve socio-economic issues collectively. CM Shah further said that realising the significance of mobilising communities for collective action, the government decided to extend the project to Jacobabad and Tharparkar districts in 2010 by allocating funds worth Rs2 bn for the purpose of expanding the scope of the project. Planning and Development (P&D) chairman Muhammad Waseem also briefed the meeting on UC based PRP. He said that it had achieved great success in Shikarpur, Kashmore, Jacoabad and Tharparkar districts. He added that 175 UCs were covered under the initiative and grants as well as interest free loans were provided to 10,043 and 112,406 households respectively. Muhammad Waseem said that under the programme, 9,072 low cost housing units were provided to shelter-less households, 1,124 household were granted water supply, 34,211 persons were imparted vocational training, 195 schools were made functional, 43 small villages were rehabilitated and a total of 114,328 households were provided protection of micro health insurance plan. He said that considering success of programme, chief minister further expanded programme to six districts, Umerkot, Sanghar, Mirpurkhas, Kahirpur, Vadin and Thatta in 2017. As per details, these schemes are being implemented through Sindh Rural Support Organistaion led by Shoaib Sultan Khan. The European Union (EU) has also launched a similar programme namely, ‘Union Council and Community Economic Strengthening Support’ targeting reduction of poverty and enhancement of livelihoods in eight more districts by investing Rs 8 bn. Planning and Development (P&D) Chairman Muhammad Waseem, Principal Secretary to CM Sajjid Jamal Abro, Sindh Rural Support Organisation chairman Shoaib Sultan Khan, SRSO chief executive officer (CEO) Dittal Kalhoro and other relevant officials attended the meeting. Published in Daily Times, September 6th 2018.