Threat to social protection programmes

We don't know whether the federal and provincial governments have given enough attention to the impending obstacles to various social protection programmes in the wake of the 18th Amendment of the Constitution, but the World Bank in a report titled "Pakistan towards an Integrated National Safety Net System" has identified certain important issues, which need to be attended to urgently. According to the report, overall funding to the provinces will be a critical issue for programmes that depend on resource mobilisation, rather than budgetary allocations, and where resources to-date have been centrally pooled and then distributed among the provinces. This includes Zakat and the Workers Welfare Boards. As per the 18th Amendment, the Federal Ministry of Zakat and Ushr as well as the Ministry of Social Welfare and Special Education have been disbanded, while the Ministry of Labour and Manpower, under which the Workers Welfare Fund fell, has been devolved. One of the major concerns of the World Bank is that it still remains to be decided who will support/compensate for the weaker capacities and finances, especially in the smaller provinces. As needs are greatest in the smaller provinces, mechanisms will have to be found to facilitate these provinces to take on devolved responsibilities, so that their population is not further disadvantaged. The World Bank is, however, hopeful about the utility of the poverty data base of the BISP in streamlining the thrust of social protection programmes. To cite an example, in order to address its needs and priorities, one province may want to operate with a more generous poverty score-based eligibility criteria covering extra households; another province may run a skills programme for a subset of BISP eligible households; and yet another one may provide additional health insurance to some group. The integrated database of BISP would enable provinces to minimise unintentional overlaps and duplication of interventions. Considering the externalities to education and health investments, the Federal government may also encourage the use of the available database by providing matching grants for selected provincial grants that serve to achieve national human development goals. As widely reported, there is already a great deal of confusion both at the federal and provincial levels about the division of responsibilities and the modus operandi to be followed under the new arrangement. Sometimes, it appears that provinces had made a lot of hue and cry for the devolution of powers to score political points, but they had not done the necessary spadework beforehand and were not fully prepared to assume new obligations. Although their share from the divisible pool has been raised from 46 percent to 57 percent under the latest NFC Award, but the responsibilities entrusted to the provinces after the 18th Amendment are also quite burdensome and crying out for concrete efforts and focused attention on the part of provincial governments to meet people's expectations. The need to avoid glitches to ensure continuity in social protection programmes, in particular, is certainly the most urgent, since it involves the provision of basic human needs without which people could suffer immensely and even lose their lives in extreme cases. The World Bank, in our view, has done a service to the policymakers of the country to identify likely problems in the social sector in the wake of the 18th Amendment so that necessary measures could be taken in time by the federal and provincial governments to streamline the situation which could get complex, if left unattended. There is no denying the fact that after the 18th Amendment, provinces have to mobilise a higher level of resources for social protection programmes through various means, develop or upgrade the capacity to ensure their spending in the most efficient manner and maintain a close relationship with the federal government to seek advice and more assistance in certain cases. Of course, smaller provinces would find themselves at a disadvantaged position to start with but have to be compensated somehow to maintain their original programmes intact. This is necessary so that people in the smaller provinces, who are dependent on social protection programmes in some way or the other, do not feel discriminated against. The World Bank may not have touched upon all the aspects of the problem, but has certainly identified an issue which requires a very careful examination and probably some revision in the relevant rules to ensure that at least social protection programmes continue to get the priority they deserve in all the nooks and corners of the country.