BAHAWALPUR:A day-long discussion was held at Bahawal Gymkhana here on Thursday development priorities, challenges, and opportunities in South Punjab.
The discussions centered around the administrative, developmental, and governance challenges in the region and focused on formulating a strategy to provide the needed technical and financial support to improve the development indicators in South Punjab. The South Punjab Deep Dive discussion was held by the United Nations in Pakistan to bring the government and other development partners on a common platform to make the most effective use of resources. The UN is currently working on developing its next 5-year work plan, namely the United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF) 2023-27 and has been holding a series of consultations over the past year with federal and provincial governments, development partners, and other stakeholders to focus on different priorities, challenges and opportunities to make their interventions more effective. This cooperation framework is the first one after the UN Development System reforms and every effort is being made to include the most important areas for Pakistan. This deep-dive on South Punjab was another similar endeavor, in an effort to bring together all the stakeholders who are working to improve the development indicators in Pakistan on a common platform so that resources, efforts, funding, and focus can be pooled to maximize the impacts of their interventions. The day before the dialogue, the participants were given an opportunity to visit different projects in the area and witness the ongoing work, as well as interact with the local men and women benefiting from these projects. Three teams spent the day visiting different areas of Multan, Rahim Yar Khan, and Bahawalpur. Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi in his address also mentioned the UN’s work on the Living River Initiative, which is being undertaken on the Prime Minister’s advice. A similar consultative process is being followed for developing the master plan in collaboration with the Ministry of Climate Change. Climate change is also of immediate concern in South Punjab and this deep-dive ensures that those concerns become part of and get addressed in the overall narrative. Federal Minister for Industries and Production Makhdoom Khusro Bakhtiar also expressed gratitude towards the UN, EU, World Bank, Canada, Germany, and other international donors for visiting Bahawalpur for the dialogue. Panel discussions were held on different key areas to highlight issues and open up dialogue on how to build collaboration to accelerate development, women’s empowerment, and improve socioeconomic indicators.