Committee constituted to implement Provincial Action Plan

PESHAWAR: Chief Minister Mahmood Khan on Tuesday constituted a ministerial committee to implement the Provincial Action Plan.

The step was taken during the third meeting of the Provincial Population Task Force chaired by the chief minister, said an official handout.

Members of provincial cabinet Shahram Tarakai, Taimur Salim Jhagra, Akbar Ayub, Fazal Shakoor, Kamran Bangash, Ahmad Hussain Shah, Muhammad Zahoor, Chief Secretary Kazim Niaz, administrative secretaries and other members of the task force attended the meeting, said an official handout.

Expressing satisfaction at the progress on Provincial Action Plan, the forum underlined the need to improve it and constituted the ministerial committee.

The committee comprising provincial cabinet members will come up with workable and solid proposals to implement the Action Plan in an effective way.

The committee members will include Minister for Health Taimur Saleem Jhagra, Elementary and Higher Education Minister Shahram Khan Tarakai, Local Government Minister Akbar Ayub, Special Assistant for Population Welfare Ahmad Hussain Shah, Special Assistant for Information Kamran Bangash and Special Assistant for Religious Affairs Muhammad Zahoor.

Briefing the forum about the progress on the Provincial Action Plan, it was informed that in the light of the decision of Council of Common Interests on establishing National and Provincial Task Forces, Provincial Population Task Force was set up and an Implementation Committee as well as provincial task force secretariat was notified.

It was informed that to strike a balance between population and resources federal monitoring and evaluation framework was reviewed at provincial level, adding that feedback on that framework had also been provided to the federal government.

In order to ensure universal access to family planning and reproductive health services, all the public health facilities, BHUs, RHCs, THQs, DHQs and tertiary healthcare facilities were mandated to deliver family planning services as part of the essential services package. The contraceptives have been made part of essential drug lists.

The meeting was apprised that KP reproductive Healthcare Rights Act 2020 has been enacted and Early Child Marriage Restraint Bill drafted and vetted by Law Department as well.

As many as 700 Ulema have been trained under the UNFPA annual work plan.

A non-ADP scheme titled “Integrated Project for Implementation of the CCI recommendations” to address high population growth rate had also been approved with a total cost of Rs 91.483 million.

It was added that 18 public sector universities have included the topic of “Population Dynamics of Pakistan” in various courses and the same was under process in the rest of the universities.

Besides, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Judicial Academy and Provincial Services Academy have also been approached to include population modules in the training material.

The form was told that to establish 200 Family Welfare Centres in the province, hiring of staff is under process. Estimated cost of the project is Rs 858 million.

The chief minister directed the officials concerned to make these family welfare centres functional within the next one and a half months.