BISP completes nationwide poverty survey: five million families eligible for receiving Rs 1,000 per month

Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) has completed its nationwide poverty survey and identified more than five million families eligible for receiving an assistance of Rs 1,000 per month.
Well-placed sources told Business Recorder here on Thursday that the poverty survey was launched by BISP in October 2010 in all districts of the country, including the districts of AJK and Gilgit-Baltistan to provide an equal opportunity to every Pakistani who holds a Computerised National Identify Card (CNIC) to get registered with BISP regardless of caste, creed and religion.
Sources said that in order to identify the poor and deserving families, the government had planned a nationwide survey to implement a Poverty Scorecard. "Overall around 98 percent of the households have been surveyed while survey in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan and AJK has also been completed," sources said. The survey was conducted in 38 districts of Punjab, 27 of Sindh, 24 of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 30 of Balochistan, and in 7 districts of AJK, Gilgit-Baltistan and Fata each.
Specific targets of BISP over the MTBF period (July 2011-June 2014) included completion of a nationwide poverty scorecard survey in all districts of Pakistan, covering almost 25 million households, identification of 5-7 million beneficiary families, unconditional monthly cash transfer of Rs 1,000/month to approximately 7 million families per annum and launching of a conditional cash transfer programme to support the education of beneficiary families' children.
Sources said that total population covered in Punjab was 77 percent, 88 percent in Sindh, 79 percent in KP and Balochistan each, 90 percent in AJK, and 89 percent in Gilgit-Baltistan. "According to the data collected, 1.6 million families in Punjab, 2 million in Sindh, 1 million in KP, 0.4 million in Balochistan and Gilgit-Baltistan each, and 0.08 million families in AJK have been identified that are eligible for a monthly cash disbursement of Rs 1,000," sources elaborated.
In the federal budget 2011-12, an amount of Rs 50 billion had been earmarked for BISP outside the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) against Rs 50 billion earmarked in budget 2010-11 that was revised downward to Rs 35 billion due to severe financial constraints. "It is expected that the budgetary allocation made for BISP would be increased from the current Rs 50 billion to Rs 65 billion during the fiscal year 2011-12," sources said.