Welcome to the United Nations
Key Messages of Pakistan’s VNR– HLPF 2022
Pakistan is committed to achieving SDGs with a focus on building forward better in the Decade of Action following the spirit of inclusivity, equity and sustainability
Commitment towards the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
- Implementation of the 2030 agenda in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic provided an opportunity to rethink our priorities inter alia to build forward better in the decade of action.
- National Economic Council sub-committee on SDGs is established to provide highest level oversight and strategic guidance.
- For effective legislations on SDGs implementation 20 sub-groups of parliamentary task forces on SDGs are formed at the National parliament.
- Development program are SDGs tagged for effectively tracing the contribution of development programs towards SDGs.
- Pakistan and Sri Lanka are twinning for the current VNR. It is opening multiple avenues for a longer term South-South cooperation on SDGs.
Inclusive and Equitable Sustainable Development
- Pakistan’s progress towards inclusive development is evident from the reduction in poverty by 2.4 percentage points and inequality by 1.7 percentage points during 2015-16 to 2018-19.
- World Bank recognised Pakistan’s social protection program as fourth largest program (according to the coverage) globally providing 16.9 million households during COVID-19.
- Disability disaggregated data is available in national surveys allowing for targeted programs for eliminating inequalities and discriminations in all its forms.
- The parliament of Pakistan passed Transgender Protection Act 2018 to protect the rights of inheritance, education, employment and health along with right to vote and hold public office.
- Opening up the policy of digital and financial literacy for all led to an increase in mobile phones penetration amongst 50 percent of the population. In addition, Pakistani startups spotted 2nd position in South Asia in 2021.
Localization key strategy for SDGs Acceleration
- Stunting reduction programs such as the Nashounama program are started to reduce the prevalence of stunting; percentage of stunting was 37.6 percent in 2017-18, on average declining at 1.44 percentage points.
- Food security dashboard was instrumental in tracking food shortage at district level during COVID-19. It tracks agriculture production, food consumption patterns, generate early price alerts and seasonal availability of essential agricultural food commodities.
- COVID-19 provides and impetus to invest in health sector. In the year 2020 public investment in the health sector was increased by 410 percent; 152 health facilities were equipped across all districts during COVID-19.
- Sehat Sahulat Card, a Health Insurance scheme, is successfully implemented, covering more than 60 percent of the population.
- Adult Literacy Program established over 170,190 adult literacy centers increases the literacy and numeracy skills to approximately 3.98 million adults, especially females.
- Pakistan is committed to increase the renewable energy share to 30 percent by 2030.
- World Economic Forum recognised Pakistan as one of the countries committed to the challenge of initiating a green recovery to protect nature and create much needed employment.
- Ban on the use of plastic bags, tree plantation, indus basin ecological restoration etc are among the major climate mitigation and adaptation strategies implemented in the last three years.
Resilient Recovery from Covid-19
- Recovery from COVID pandemic requires cautious but aggressive strategy that saves lives, saves livelihood and salvage economy.
- The smart lockdown policy and other pandemic containment measures have minimized socio-economic shocks.
- For rigorous monitoring and strategic decisions National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) was established to steer the pandemic situation and propose the required directions.
- Existing EPI immunization program infrastructure during COVID-19 was adopted for COVID-19 testing and vaccination.
- Approximately 20.63 million lost their jobs or experienced reduction or loss of income during the first wave of pandemic, i.e., April to July 2020. Nonetheless, path towards normalcy started soon after July 2020 towards V shaped recovery.
- Government stimulus package lessened the adverse impact on poverty, food security and upgrade health infrastructure.
- Digitization of the economy is per se the best outcome of pandemic. Several mobile phone applications such as vaccination certificate, grocery apps, citizen portal etc, and one window service centers improved the overall governance, and service delivery.
