ISLAMABAD: The Finance Ministry has said that an allocation of Rs 1,900 billion under the federal public sector development programme (PSDP) in last five years has significantly improved socio-economic conditions of the less developed areas.
The comparison of the socio-economic indicators shows that majority of the indicators have improved whereas the performance in some of the sectors remained stagnant. “Improvement in socio-economic conditions of the people is result of effective implementation of schemes/initiatives emanated from plans/ policies of the Government in various sectors of the economy including implementation of development projects/ schemes under Federal Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP)” a well placed source at Finance Ministry told this scribe here on Saturday.
“Annual average GDP growth stood at 3.8% during 2010-14 as compared to 3.6% during 2007-10 and per capita income increased from $ 1072 in 2009-10 to $ 1386 in 2013-14” the source added, saying that inflation (CPI) was also contained from annual average at 12% during 2007-16 to animal average at 10% during 2011-14.
The source said that authenticity and accuracy of socio-economic indicators could be gauged through perusal of publications such as Pakistan Social and Living Standards Measurement Survey conducted by Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, Pakistan Economic Survey launched by Ministry of Finance.
“Annual Plan launched by Planning Commission vis-a-vis targets set under these plans and policies during the said period has also been a tool of development of less developed areas” the source added saying that development of less developed areas was also the top priority of the government.
“Consequence of 18th amendment, approval of 7th National Finance Commission (NFC) Award and cancellation of concurrent list, the development of less developed areas is a devolved subject and it fell under the domain of Provincial Governments, the federal government supplements the provincial government’s efforts to improve living standard of the poor” the source observed.
The source said that with the objective to ensure effective execution and timely completion of PSDP funded development projects, Projects Wing of the Planning Commission had been strengthened to undertake periodic monitoring of development projects to identify any bottlenecks faced by the executing agencies and suggest remedial measures.
Besides, the source said that mechanism for early approval of projects and timely releases of development funds was being ensured by Ministry of Finance, however, basic responsibility rested with sponsoring Ministries to ensure implementation of the projects in a timely and cost
