As many as 19 United Nations entities working in Pakistan would be joining hands in implementing the 'One UN Program' in Pakistan to address infrastructure, environment, health, agriculture, poverty reduction, and child and mother healthcare issues.
The United Nations and the Environment Ministry on Monday gathered experts at a workshop on One UN Joint Country Program, to deliberate on the program and prepare outline to formulate a strategy to effectively implement the program.
Environment Secretary Ijaz Qureshi inaugurated the workshop on environment resting hopes, it would provide an opportunity for interactive deliberations to streamline direction towards achieving environmental sustainability in Pakistan.
He reiterated the government's commitment towards environment and mentioned to increase in financial resource allocation and priority attached to the subject in Mid Term Development Framework (MTDF) 2005-10, Vision - 2030 and other national development initiatives.
He also mentioned to develop National Environment Policy, National Sanitation Policy, National Energy Conservation Policy and Draft National Forestry Policy have been prepared and action is underway for their implementation, as part of ministry's commitment to the cause.
Ijaz Qureshi appreciated the support and co-operation extended by UNDP and Unicef and other UN agencies to the ministry and described it as a great help to develop the policies and initiate to follow up programmes for their implementation.
"The new window of opportunity created with the inclusion of 'Environment' in one of the core programme provides excellent opportunity to further enhance this co-operation and enable this ministry to address the environmental; issues holistically to respond both to national and international obligations in the area of environment," the secretary said.
Ijaz Qureshi proposed to widen the scope of consultation on One UN Reforms Situational Analysis Report of the environment sector in Pakistan, with all line agencies and termed the workshop as a commencement of this process.
"I am sure the consultation process would help participants to come up with concrete inputs to facilitate finalisation of the Joint Country Work Programme on Environment," said Qureshi, adding: "Environmental degradation is costing Pakistan around Rs 1 billion a day."
He said the ministry considers it vital that the results, impacts and shortcomings of United Nations Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF) implemented during 2004-08 may be of great help in providing necessary feedback in developing the present program.
"The deliberation should also focus on environmental main streaming, in all sectoral and cross sectoral areas like environmental education and awareness, environment and human health and sustainable urbanisation," he said.
"The Ministry considers that the One UN Joint Country Programme on Environment could serve as an important vehicle for implementing the National 'Environment Polices and effectively address the sectoral and cross-sectoral issues," Qureshi added.
He was confident that with the support from all relevant quarters the implementation and management of the programme will be timely and smooth. He said the workshop, to be followed by a series at provincial level, would help identify priority areas as well as provide input to elaborate work frames and a platform for joint environment program.
Environment Director General Javed Ali Khan presented an overview of the workshop and identified environment, agriculture, rural development and poverty reduction, child and maternal health and disaster management as key areas of focus in the workshop.
Comments
Comments are closed.