Ineffective role in poverty alleviation: PPAF comes under fire in ECC meeting

Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund (PPAF) is reportedly making its officials more prosperous instead of eliminating the poverty of poor people living below the poverty line across the country. This is the crux of a hectic discussion during the presentation of Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund (PPAF) at a recent meeting of Economic Co-ordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet, presided over by the Minister for Finance, Abdul Hafeez Shaikh.
The presentation noted that Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund (PPAF) was instituted in 1997 and became operational in April 2000. It was formed under section 42 of the Company's Ordinance under the overall supervision of Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan. It has an independent Board of Director (BoD). It aims at poverty reduction in the country. It engages with the Government of Pakistan (GoP) through its members/ special committee/ task force and programs etc.
ECC was further informed that partners in development are the World Bank, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), US Department of Agriculture (USDA), Development Bank of Germany, US Agency for International Development (USAID), Bechtel, Citigroup, Deloittee, General Electric, Pfizer, Ups, Xerox, Microcredit Summit Campaign, Princes of Wales Charities (IBLF, BITC), Citibank, Tetrapak, Shakarganj, Unilever, Agitech, Engro (Pakistan) and Engrofoods, ENI (Pakistan).
It has an outreach of 127 districts (95 per cent coverage), 87 partners, 80,000 villages/ settlements (40 per cent coverage), 242,000 community organisations and output for micro-credit loans is 3,800,000, infrastructure including H&E projects are 22,800 housing units are 120,000 and tainted 447,000 individuals. It was also revealed that PPAF extends assistance through drought management, earthquake reconstruction and flood relief. It spends 5 percent on partner organisations, one percent PPAF administrative expenses and 94 percent direct services to the poor. Main objective of fund is restoring hope, securing the future and poverty reduction.
It was observed that an amount of $1.2 billion has been spent by the PPAF for alleviation of the poverty over a period of 10 years, whereas poverty has increased manifold. "There is no integrated and focused approach and mechanism to address the issue of poverty. Duplication of activities among different organisations such as National Rural Support Programme (NRSP), PPAF and public sector is another sore point," the sources quoted ECC members are saying.
According to the ECC, there is no linkage between PPAF and public representatives. Public representatives do not know from where the money is coming for the PPAF and how it is spent? Most of the representatives do not have this programme in their constituency despite the fact that poverty exists everywhere in Pakistan. It was further observed that the programme should be launched with focused and targeted objectives.