Category Archives: Development and Poverty

An unemotional look at Edhi

Archive Edition, Development and Poverty, Economy, Social Issues

 By Zubeida Mustafa

85-13-01-1995ABDUS SATTAR EDHI has been in the news ever since television brought him into the limelight with a programme on him in 1988. Pictures of him standing on the roadside to collect alms (bheek, to use his own word) are quite familiar to newspaper readers. Unfortunately, the maulana (as he is fondly called because of his shaggy beard) was forced to leave the country recently when he felt threatened. His statements accusing unnamed agencies of trying to eliminate him politicised him, which is not something good for his work. One only hopes the row will blow over.

The fact is no one has ever questioned this old man’s love for thpoor. His work for the destitute has not only brought him recognition and laurels (including the coveted Ramon Magsaysay award). It has also won for him the confidence of the people. The faith the public has reposed in him is central to his work. For Edhi’s huge network of welfare organisations depends entirely on voluntary donations worth over Rs two billion.  According to the same calculation, the maulana needs another 210 million to invest and bring returns to meet his day-to-day expenses. But he has other ambitions too. He wants to set up a chain of welfare centres 25 kilometres apart all over the country.

For a semi-literate person with hardly any political or social clout to mobilise massive amounts through voluntary donations, at times by simply standing on the roadside collection box in hand, is so remarkable. More so, because the donations come from a society so notorious as ours for tax evasion. It is difficult to believe that people who go to all extremes to cheat the government can be so generous when it comes to giving donations for a charitable cause.But the army of beggars which subsists on public philanthropy, the langars set up outside mazaars and other congregation spots to feed the poor, and the scores of appeals for assistance (which are presumably answered) from organisations is working for public welfare are testimony to the generosity of the Pakistanis. Continue reading An unemotional look at Edhi →

The price of neglecting social sectors

Administration, Archive Edition, Children and Youth, Defence and Disarmament, Development and Poverty, Economy, Education, Environment, Health, Housing, Population, Social Issues, War and Peace, Women

By Zubeida Mustafa

The state of the social sector in a country is an accurate measure of the value it attaches to human life. For howsoever strong a state might be in terms of military power and rich in economic resources, its institutional greatness will be judged by the quality of life it ovides its citizens.

This is basically determined by the social policy of the government, that is, the priority it gives to providing education, health care, housing and family planning facilities to the people. Pakistan’s performance in this context has not been one of which one can be overly proud. Of course, it depends on how one defines progress. If it is simply a matter of moving forward in terms of absolute numbers from a given baseline — a very low one at that — the country’s achievements over the decades since 1947 might appear to be very impressive. Continue reading The price of neglecting social sectors →

Allocations fail to match verbal commitments to social sector

Archive Edition, Balochistan, Development and Poverty, Economy, Education, Health, Population, Social Issues, Water, Women

By Zubeida Mustafa

76-26-06-1993A

In his budget speech, the Federal Finance Minister emphasised that a key element of the government’s economic strategy was “continued priority to development of education, health, nutrition, housing, population welfare and other social facilities”. But the thrust of the budget and the performance in the social sectors in the outgoing year as documented in the Economic Survey, 1992-93 belied any serious official commitment to human resource development.

76-26-06-1993B

Although some sectors such as health and education are financed and managed mainly by the provinces, the federal budget was a fair indicator of the progress to be expected in these areas of national life. It was plain that in actual fact human development figured low in the government’s priorities. There is now greater reliance on the private sector for filling the enormous gap in education and health. Thus of the Rs 257.7 billion federal revenue expenditure only Rs 6.9 billion (2.6 per cent) is to go towards financing the social services. As usual debt servicing and defence will take away the biggest chunks. On the development side, the social sectors will receive a bigger percentage (3.4) but the amount will be smaller in absolute terms (Rs 1.8 billion).

Education has been badly downgraded. The allocations for this sector in both the revenue and development budgets have been reduced. In fact the allocation for education in the Continue reading Allocations fail to match verbal commitments to social sector →

No longer the rich man’s disease

Archive Edition, Development and Poverty, Health

By Zubeida Mustafa

70-30-12-1992There was a time when diabetes mellitus was regarded as the rich man’s disease. Not so any more. In fact, the data collected by epidemiologists indicate that today there is a higher incidence of this disorder in the developing countries.

Dr Peter Bennett, who is the head of the Epidemiology and Clinical Research Branch of the National Institute of Diabetes, Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the National Institute of Health, USA, has been investigating the prevalence of diabetes among the Pima Indians in America. His studies have extended.to other societies as well. “Surveys conducted over the last 15 to 20 years give very clear evidence that diabetes has been on the rise in the Third World,” Dr Bennett told me recently. He was in Karachi to attend the Regional Congress of the International Diabetes Federation. Continue reading No longer the rich man’s disease →

Increased funding amid high scepticism over real progress

Archive Edition, Children and Youth, Development and Poverty, Economy, Education, Health, Human Rights, Labour, Language

By Zubeida Mustafa

36-15-07-1988GIVEN the public outcry against the government’s failure to invest adequately in the social development of the people, the authorities in Pakistan have become more wary about making loud pronouncements about their commitment to the social sectors. What better occasion would they have of speaking about this commitment and receiving media publicity than the time of the presentation of the budgets — federal and provincial. Hence, it was no surprise that in the budget season this year each and every finance minister spoke in exaggerated terms about the social sector being his government’s major priority.

But the problem with budget speeches is that they are accompanied by budget documents and preceded by the Economic Survey which do not always substantiate the official claims. This year too the provincial governments have attempted to focus on health and education, which are central to any programme of human resource development. Although there has been an overall increase in the budgets for these two sectors, one cannot but feel sceptical about the progress that will actually be made. Continue reading Increased funding amid high scepticism over real progress →