Poverty requires deliberate measures and paradigm shift to invest on human development, said Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) Executive Director Dr Abid Qaiyum Suleri.

Dr Suleri was speaking at the launching of a report ‘Clustered Deprivation: District Profile of Poverty in Pakistan’ by SDPI.

Dr Suleri said that poverty should not remain merely a number game for government. Referring to absolute poverty in conflict ridden Balochistan and Fata, he said that when poverty and food security take an identity be it ethnic, religious or provincial, it leads to disintegration and destruction of social fabric of society.

Arif Naveed from SDPI presenting findings of the report said that 33 per cent of household are living below the poverty line in Pakistan with numbers amounting to 58.7 million people. He said that Balochistan is the poorest of all provinces with 52 per cent population living below poverty line, followed by Sindh with 33 per cent, KP with 32 per cent and Punjab with 19 per cent. Refereeing to 46 per cent rural poverty compared with 18% urban poverty, he said that the report identifies stark inequalities over the incidence of poverty across regions, between provinces and within each province.

Mr Naveed asked the government to adopt multidimensional framework to assess human welfare and revisit rural development strategies in view of higher rates of poverty in rural area.

Dr Geof Wood, Emeritus Professor, University of Bath, UK, gave a special philosophical lecture on ‘Rediscovering our common wealth’ on the occasion in which he argued that sustainability and long term well being is an equality issue. He said that human’s personal sense of well being depends upon those around us. Likewise, in the future, the well being of our descendants will depend upon the well being of thei

Poverty requires deliberate measures and paradigm shift to invest on human development, said Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) Executive Director Dr Abid Qaiyum Suleri.

Dr Suleri was speaking at the launching of a report ‘Clustered Deprivation: District Profile of Poverty in Pakistan’ by SDPI.

Dr Suleri said that poverty should not remain merely a number game for government. Referring to absolute poverty in conflict ridden Balochistan and Fata, he said that when poverty and food security take an identity be it ethnic, religious or provincial, it leads to disintegration and destruction of social fabric of society.

Arif Naveed from SDPI presenting findings of the report said that 33 per cent of household are living below the poverty line in Pakistan with numbers amounting to 58.7 million people. He said that Balochistan is the poorest of all provinces with 52 per cent population living below poverty line, followed by Sindh with 33 per cent, KP with 32 per cent and Punjab with 19 per cent. Refereeing to 46 per cent rural poverty compared with 18% urban poverty, he said that the report identifies stark inequalities over the incidence of poverty across regions, between provinces and within each province.

Mr Naveed asked the government to adopt multidimensional framework to assess human welfare and revisit rural development strategies in view of higher rates of poverty in rural area.

Dr Geof Wood, Emeritus Professor, University of Bath, UK, gave a special philosophical lecture on ‘Rediscovering our common wealth’ on the occasion in which he argued that sustainability and long term well being is an equality issue. He said that human’s personal sense of well being depends upon those around us. Likewise, in the future, the well being of our descendants will depend upon the well being of their contemporaries, he said.

He said that mankind may run out of technological responses to solving climate change and other related problems such as food security. This, he said, calls for an urgent global social contract for sustainable behaviour. He said that in the present context of global capitalist crisis, the world may be ready for more regulation to modify present excesses.

r contemporaries, he said.

He said that mankind may run out of technological responses to solving climate change and other related problems such as food security. This, he said, calls for an urgent global social contract for sustainable behaviour. He said that in the present context of global capitalist crisis, the world may be ready for more regulation to modify present excesses.