From wasted resources to social progress: financing Pakistan’s future

Pakistan is grappling with significant social issues, such as poverty, child labour, abuse, and unequal access to education and healthcare.

These challenges are not isolated; they are interconnected, with child labour and abuse often perpetuating poverty. At the same time, lack of access to quality education and healthcare creates a cycle of intergenerational hardship. This cycle makes it harder for families to break free from poverty.

The typical explanation for these issues often revolves around fiscal constraints. Budget deficits limit the government’s ability to invest in essential social services. While this concern is real, the deeper issue lies not just in a lack of resources, but in the inefficient use of resources that the state already controls.

Across the country, valuable public assets remain idle or underutilized, while significant sums are lost each year to wasteful expenditure and poorly targeted subsidies. In a fiscally constrained environment, unlocking these dormant resources offers a realistic and sustainable path to financing social development without raising taxes or increasing public debt.

Pakistan finds itself in a catch-22 situation. Budget deficits limit the government’s ability to invest in education, healthcare, and poverty alleviation, but underinvestment in these very sectors perpetuates low productivity, unemployment, and child labour.

Underfunded schools fail to provide the necessary education to break the cycle, while families in rural areas often send their children to work rather than school because they cannot afford the fees.

At the same time, many children suffer from physical and sexual abuse, often at the hands of those meant to protect them. This neglect and exploitation undermine the country’s future potential.

Expanding welfare programmes through borrowing may offer temporary relief, but it deepens fiscal vulnerability and erodes credibility. A more sustainable path is to reorder fiscal priorities, reduce wasteful expenditures, and reinvest savings into long-term social programs. By doing so, Pakistan can address both its budgetary challenges and the social issues that continue to harm its most vulnerable populations.

One of the most visible examples of idle public wealth is government-owned land and property. Official residences, administrative buildings, and plots allocated for senior officials often occupy high-value urban and peri-urban locations, yet they generate little economic or social return.

These arrangements may have made sense in the past, but today they represent a significant opportunity cost in a country that struggles to finance basic human development initiatives. The government must prioritise unlocking these idle assets and using the proceeds to fund critical welfare programs.

However, land is just one part of the solution. Across various government departments and public entities, surplus buildings, equipment, commercial assets, and other resources remain underutilized. Retaining these assets in low-productivity uses while schools, clinics, and employment programmes remain underfunded imposes a hidden cost. Public resources are tied up in inefficient uses, leaving critical sectors underfunded.

What Pakistan needs is not indiscriminate sell-offs or fiscal shock therapy, but a selective and transparent asset-recycling strategy. Constitutionally protected, strategically sensitive, and operationally essential assets should remain untouched. At the same time, surplus or underutilised assets—whether land or otherwise should be identified and deployed more productively through market-based processes that protect the public interest.

Just as important as monetizing assets is how the proceeds are used. Funds generated from asset recycling should not be absorbed into routine government expenditure, where they risk disappearing into administrative overheads.

Instead, they should be directed into a dedicated Social Development Fund, established by law and governed by clear rules. Such a fund would finance priority areas such as education, healthcare access, poverty alleviation, and employment generation, ensuring that one-time asset sales are transformed into long-term social investment.

International experience shows that when idle public assets are converted into human capital, the returns are far greater. Singapore is a prime example, where the government has leased public land for private development while retaining ownership, generating rental income.

This strategy has financed public housing, providing affordable homes for millions. Similarly, the United Kingdom privatized state-owned enterprises in the 1980s, using the proceeds to fund public investments in healthcare and infrastructure. Chile has also leveraged its pension funds to finance social infrastructure projects, such as housing and healthcare.

In Canada, the government has sold non-essential assets like real estate and airports, directing the funds to education and healthcare. Lastly, South Korea has effectively used public land for urban renewal and public housing projects, benefiting the population and stimulating economic growth.

Pakistan can draw valuable lessons from these examples. By adopting a strategic approach to asset recycling whether land, SOEs, or underutilized government property it can unlock significant funds for social welfare, without resorting to debt.

However, asset recycling alone is not enough. Complementary reforms are needed to address expenditure inefficiencies that quietly drain public finances each year. Tighter controls on administrative overheads, improved procurement practices, and the rationalization of poorly targeted subsidies can generate significant savings.

Even modest efficiency gains, sustained year after year, can free up crucial funds for social development.

At the same time, public resources should be redirected toward productive activity, particularly through targeted support for small and medium enterprises (SMEs).

SMEs are the backbone of employment generation in Pakistan, yet they struggle to access finance and stable policy support. By shifting resources away from wasteful expenditure and toward productive enterprises, Pakistan can expand its tax base, reduce long-term dependence on welfare programs, and promote economic growth.

For these reforms to succeed, transparency and political continuity are essential. Asset identification, valuation, and disposal must be subject to independent oversight and public disclosure to ensure accountability. The principle of converting idle assets into social investments must be institutionalized, ensuring that it survives changes in government and isn’t treated as a one-off fiscal maneuver.

Reforms should also be gradual and credible. Beginning with asset inventories and legal frameworks, followed by selective monetization and rigorous monitoring, will minimise disruption while building public trust. This is not a call for dramatic gestures, but for a steady, disciplined progress toward a sustainable fiscal future.

Pakistan does not lack resources; it lacks strategic management of those resources. By unlocking idle public assets, tightening expenditure discipline, and redirecting funds into education, healthcare, poverty alleviation, and employment generation, Pakistan can finance progress without deepening fiscal stress.

This is a realistic policy choice one that is grounded in prudence, transparency, and long-term thinking. With these reforms, Pakistan can convert dormant public wealth into lasting national strength and begin addressing the critical issues of poverty, child labour, and inequality that continue to hinder its development.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2026