Size of development budget being curtailed

[Naveed Yaseen]

ZAHEER ABBASI
ISLAMABAD (November 05 2008): The government has decided to cut the size of Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) owing to prevailing economic situation, said Planning and Development Division Secretary Suhail Safdar.

Current economic situation does not allow Rs 541 billion PSDP and ministries and divisions have been asked to prioritise the important projects that could not be avoided, said the Secretary here on Tuesday after the inaugural session of National Co-ordination Committees (NCC) on Saarc Social Charter.

Suhail Safdar said that remaining projects would be adjusted next year and only the important ones would be taken up this year. The decision to this affect would be taken in the next meeting of the Planning Commission.

To another question, he said that number of people living below poverty line must have gone up in Pakistan after global price hike. However, the accurate figures about poverty could only be ascertained by a survey that is yet to be completed, he added.

The total PSDP covers 1000 ongoing and 300 new development projects. There were reports that over Rs 100 billion cut is likely to be effected in the PDSP due to prevailing economic situation.

Earlier, addressing the inaugural session of NCC, the Secretary Planning & Development Division said the new government has taken initiatives to restore macroeconomic stability, overcome energy crisis and reduce poverty and vulnerability.

He said that the environment for trade and investment was improving and all these developments in majority of Saarc countries were impacting positively on poverty reduction, improvement in human development indicators and increase in per capita income. There are still some areas of concern with 41 percent people living below poverty line in the region with less than a dollar per day income. The joint efforts have to be made to address this situation.

Representative of the Secretary General Saarc, Hasan Shifau said that the Saarc platform could be very useful for poverty alleviation, improving literacy rate and heath facilities. The Saarc countries would have to assess progress, learning through shared knowledge and shape future of social development in South Asian region following the agenda of Saarc Social Charter.

Eizaz Ahmad Chaudhry, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Foreign Affairs in his address of welcome said that dramatic increase in oil and food prices coupled with global financial crisis ignited inflation and eroded Saarc countries' capability to maintain respectable economic growth and reduce poverty and vulnerability.

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