‘Population welfare forum should be formed’

KARACHI: The establishment of a Sindh Foundation for Population Activities was suggested by Dr Mehtab Karim, the senior fellow at George Mason University, Virginia and IoBM visiting professor. “Here all the stakeholders, for instance, the provincial government, NGOs, the private sector and key professionals could be assigned proper tasks under public-private partnership,” he explained.

Dr Karim was speaking at an interactive seminar on “Population Strategies in Sindh, New Developments under the 18th Amendment” which was jointly organised by the Centre for Studies in Sindh, Institute of Business Management (IoBM) and the Rotary Fund for Population and Sustainable Development on Saturday.

“When it comes to the welfare of the people, population planning is one of the most important things that needs to be formulated as early as possible,” he said. Muslim countries like Iran and Bangladesh follow a population plan which helped them control their overgrowing population, he added. “If a population plan can work in other Muslim countries, I do not see why it cannot happen here.”

A well-defined and formulated population plan needs to be implemented in Sindh, he said.

Also addressing the seminar, Sindh Assembly Speaker Nisar Khuhro said it is a challenge for our economists to address the fact that 10 million young people are unemployed which ultimately leads them to commit crime.

Speaking on population welfare, Khuhro said there are two major concerns: the overgrowing population and its care. “Infrastructure and facilities are available for the welfare of the public. Manpower is also there. What is lacking is the implementation.” Vision, innovation and a commitment are needed, he added. “With a growing population comes the responsibility of maintaining law and order, which we are struggling with at the moment.”

Published in The Express Tribune, January 9^th, 2011.