Plan for recovery after the floods of 2022, known as the Resilient Recovery and Reconstruction Framework, will be presented in an upcoming donors conference. The Ministry of Planning Development and Special Initiatives has ramped up its efforts to finalize the plan and arrange the donors’ conference. Secretary Planning Commission, Syed Zafar Ali Shah, held a meeting with relevant stakeholders in this regard. Diplomats, members of relief organizations and donors were present in the meeting to give their green signal to the initiative.

The Planning Commission had earlier conducted the Post-Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA) in collaboration with the World Bank, Asian Development Bank (ADB), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the European Union (EU). During the meeting, Member of the Infrastructure Planning gave a comprehensive briefing on the provisions of the plan and the seventeen sectors it will be targeting.

The most important sectors will be infrastructure, health and education. Secretary Planning Commission, Syed Zafar Ali Shah, said that the “main agenda of this meeting is to get the input of responsible stakeholders for the plan before moving on to finalizing it and presenting it in the donors’ conference.” He added, “the seventeen sectors in the plan have been included after careful consideration.

They are those which need the maximum attention, especially in light of changing climate.” The meeting was also informed of the various projects undertaken by the provincial governments in various parts of the country after the floods. The main theme, the meeting was told, is that climate resilience should be ensured in every developmental work that is undertaken.

It was further elaborated for the meeting that majority of the projects in the plan will be undertaken by the provincial governments in the respective sectors for their better implementation like the ML-1 railway track which has been reduced to nothing in the floods. Zafar Ali Shah said, “the consultative process will continue and the ministry will hold another round of meetings next week before finalizing a concrete plan to uplift the country in the rehabilitation phase.”

He continued, “Pakistan strongly pleaded its case before the COP-27 Climate Conference in Sharm El-Sheikh and urged the world to support it despite it having a less than 1% contribution to global warming.” The donors appreciated the efforts of the Planning Commission and assured their continued support in the second phase of rehabilitation.

Credit : Independent News Pakistan-WealthPk