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Country must spend 10% of GDP on health, education
ISLAMABAD: In order to keep rising poverty in check, Pakistan needs at least 10 percent of the GDP to be spent on education, health, safe drinking water, sanitation and basic infrastructurewhich will help achieve Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015. While In South Asia, India leads with 9 percent of its GDP spending on health and education while Pakistan spends around 3 percent on both.
This was a key demand at a pre budget seminar on We Demand Budget for MDGs held on Saturday. Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP) Pakistan, Awaz Foundation Pakistan and Journalists for Democracy and Human Rights (JDHR) jointly organised the seminar.
The speakers on this occasion reminded that Pakistan had committed to invest to achieve MDGs at UN MDGs Summit in September 2010 in New York and SAARC Summit in 2010 in Dhaka.
Dr Zafar Moeen Nasir, senior economist from PIDE said since we as a nation, have committed to achieve MDGs by 2015, we have to address the issue of growing hunger and poverty and put an end to mismanagement in economic governance. He said the government needs to decentralise the development budget at districts level by allocating Rs 2 billion per year for consecutive ten years so that all districts can plan and implement their development needs. Putting all districts in competition can produce good results. We need to rationalise subsidies limiting it to a few food items to end hunger, the first MDG, he added.
He said in the forthcoming budget, Rs 710 billion has been earmarked for education, child and female morality and other social sector development. Of them, Rs 430 billion will be expensed through province while Rs 280 billion will be spent by centre. He called for linking up economy with MDGs. We need political commitment to ensure services delivery under MDGs commitments. Unfortunately, no one is ready to pay direct tax. He called for proper budget estimation based on actual incomes and spending.
Sajjad Ahmad Shaikh, Joint Secretary Ministry of Finance said budget is announced for the welfare of general public. Budgetary deficit is decided in advance, which is bridged through loans. Before budget allocation, we do situation analysis of each sector. We need to do post budget analysis to ensure implementation on the budget. We need to understand limitations of the government. We should take up all MDGs achievement related demands to the provinces after the 18th amendment, as now resources will be transferred to the provinces, he said. He further said through legislation, it has been made mandatory to maintain fiscal responsibility and debt ratio has been controlled under this legislation and hence in a way commitments relating to MDGs are given protection. Our social sector spending is about to reach 8.5% mark. There should be pressure on the government to press for their demands on MDGs. Revenue and financial sector should be reformed, he said.
He said our focus should be on direct taxation and we need to build a campaign to safeguard the poor who are affected by indirect taxes. He said womens work is mostly unpaid and do not become part of the economy. We need to make it part of the economy, Sajjad added.
Fayyaz Baqir, Director Akhtar Hamid Khan Centre said unfortunately, our financial system transfers resources from the poor to rich, which should be otherwise. We need to analyse the financial system to tell the poor the truth and plug all the loopholes. We need to tell people at local level that how money is taken away from the poor. Civil society should think beyond projects. We need to work in universities and with the youth to mobilise them to undertake research on social issue. He called for training 50,000 youth in research to develop evidence-based discourse instead of discussion based discourse.
Earlier, setting the scene for the debate, Shafqat Munir President JDHR said MDGs are not luxurious concessions but very basic services to be, otherwise, dispensed with at local level. The government needs to generate resources and spend them on people through local representatives. To effectively provide these services, there is an immediate need for restoration of local governments with strong governance mechanism and financial independence and accountability and monitoring of the system by citizens. On resource mobilization for MDGs, Shafqat demanded imposition of tax on agriculture income. It is ironic that the rich are paying peanuts in tax while the poor paying billions in terms of indirect taxes, he added
Quoting the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper-II, Mohammad Zia-ur-Rehman, Chief Executive Awaz Foundation and Coordinator for GCAP South Asia pointed out that only 0.6% of the GDP is spent on health and 2.1% of GDP on education sectors. In addition to this inadequate resource allocation on these important sectors, the government should systematically cut its budgets.
Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan
ISLAMABAD: In order to keep rising poverty in check, Pakistan needs at least 10 percent of the GDP to be spent on education, health, safe drinking water, sanitation and basic infrastructurewhich will help achieve Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015. While In South Asia, India leads with 9 percent of its GDP spending on health and education while Pakistan spends around 3 percent on both.
This was a key demand at a pre budget seminar on We Demand Budget for MDGs held on Saturday. Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP) Pakistan, Awaz Foundation Pakistan and Journalists for Democracy and Human Rights (JDHR) jointly organised the seminar.
The speakers on this occasion reminded that Pakistan had committed to invest to achieve MDGs at UN MDGs Summit in September 2010 in New York and SAARC Summit in 2010 in Dhaka.
Dr Zafar Moeen Nasir, senior economist from PIDE said since we as a nation, have committed to achieve MDGs by 2015, we have to address the issue of growing hunger and poverty and put an end to mismanagement in economic governance. He said the government needs to decentralise the development budget at districts level by allocating Rs 2 billion per year for consecutive ten years so that all districts can plan and implement their development needs. Putting all districts in competition can produce good results. We need to rationalise subsidies limiting it to a few food items to end hunger, the first MDG, he added.
He said in the forthcoming budget, Rs 710 billion has been earmarked for education, child and female morality and other social sector development. Of them, Rs 430 billion will be expensed through province while Rs 280 billion will be spent by centre. He called for linking up economy with MDGs. We need political commitment to ensure services delivery under MDGs commitments. Unfortunately, no one is ready to pay direct tax. He called for proper budget estimation based on actual incomes and spending.
Sajjad Ahmad Shaikh, Joint Secretary Ministry of Finance said budget is announced for the welfare of general public. Budgetary deficit is decided in advance, which is bridged through loans. Before budget allocation, we do situation analysis of each sector. We need to do post budget analysis to ensure implementation on the budget. We need to understand limitations of the government. We should take up all MDGs achievement related demands to the provinces after the 18th amendment, as now resources will be transferred to the provinces, he said. He further said through legislation, it has been made mandatory to maintain fiscal responsibility and debt ratio has been controlled under this legislation and hence in a way commitments relating to MDGs are given protection. Our social sector spending is about to reach 8.5% mark. There should be pressure on the government to press for their demands on MDGs. Revenue and financial sector should be reformed, he said.
He said our focus should be on direct taxation and we need to build a campaign to safeguard the poor who are affected by indirect taxes. He said womens work is mostly unpaid and do not become part of the economy. We need to make it part of the economy, Sajjad added.
Fayyaz Baqir, Director Akhtar Hamid Khan Centre said unfortunately, our financial system transfers resources from the poor to rich, which should be otherwise. We need to analyse the financial system to tell the poor the truth and plug all the loopholes. We need to tell people at local level that how money is taken away from the poor. Civil society should think beyond projects. We need to work in universities and with the youth to mobilise them to undertake research on social issue. He called for training 50,000 youth in research to develop evidence-based discourse instead of discussion based discourse.
Earlier, setting the scene for the debate, Shafqat Munir President JDHR said MDGs are not luxurious concessions but very basic services to be, otherwise, dispensed with at local level. The government needs to generate resources and spend them on people through local representatives. To effectively provide these services, there is an immediate need for restoration of local governments with strong governance mechanism and financial independence and accountability and monitoring of the system by citizens. On resource mobilization for MDGs, Shafqat demanded imposition of tax on agriculture income. It is ironic that the rich are paying peanuts in tax while the poor paying billions in terms of indirect taxes, he added
Quoting the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper-II, Mohammad Zia-ur-Rehman, Chief Executive Awaz Foundation and Coordinator for GCAP South Asia pointed out that only 0.6% of the GDP is spent on health and 2.1% of GDP on education sectors. In addition to this inadequate resource allocation on these important sectors, the government should systematically cut its budgets.
Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan
