Islamabad 12 May, 2009: Mr. Ajay Chhibber, UN Assistant Secretary General and UNDP Assistant Administrator, and Director of the Regional Bureau for Asia and the Pacific left today on May 12th 2010 after completing a four-day visit. He was here to discuss key humanitarian and development challenges faced by Pakistan and UN and UNDP’s response to them. While in Pakistan, Mr. Chhibber met with the Mr. Farooq H Naik, Chairman Senate, Dr. Hafeez Sheikh, Finance Advisor, Mr. Hameedullah Jan Afridi, Minster of Environment, Dr. Farzana Raja, Director, Benazir Income Support Programme, Ms. Shahnaz Wazir Ali, Special Assistant to the PM on Social Sector and other senior government officials, international donors and civil society representatives. He was accompanied by Mr. Fikret Akcura, Resident Coordinator and Resident Representative and Mr. Toshihiro Tanaka, Country Director UNDP.
During the meeting with the Chairman Senate, Mr. Chhibber appreciated the efforts of the Chairman to further deepen democracy in Pakistan and acknowledged increased women representation in the Parliament which compares favorably with other countries in region. UNDP pledged to support projects to strengthen the capacity of Parliament and Senate to deepen democracy.
In his meeting with Mr. Hafeez Sheikh, Finance Advisor to the PM, the discussion focused on social security, regional cooperation and aid effectiveness. Social protection and regional cooperation can be instrumental in addressing some of the key challenges facing Pakistan. UNDP will work closely with the Government on social protection policy framework and strategy development. This was reiterated in the meeting with Ms. Shahnaz Wazir Ali, where UNDP was requested to provide technical support towards strengthening the social protection system in Pakistan. As part of its governance support to Pakistan, UNDP was also requested to support the Government in enhancing aid effectiveness through the Economic Affairs Division.
While discussing the Benazir Income Support Programme with Dr. Farzana Raja, Mr. Chhibber offered UNDP’s services to create a monitoring and evaluation system for the programme and help devise an exit strategy. UNDP also has the cross-country experience on implementing various schemes such as conditional cash transfer mechanisms.
During his four-day visit, the Regional Director also met with Mr. Hameedullah Jan Afridi , Minister of Environment and exchanged views on several environmental issues including climate change, clean development mechanisms, natural resource and water shed management. UNDP promised support on helping build capacity in the area of climate change and access to global financing.
In his meetings with government counterparts, bilateral and multilateral donors, the Regional Director expressed his concerns over the resource challenges to the implementation of the One UN Programme. The upcoming international conference on the UN Delivering as One in Hanoi on June 14-16 will take stock the progress thus far and lessons learnt from the 8 UN pilot countries, including Pakistan and other self-starter pilots in the region.
At a meeting with the donor community, Mr. Chhibber emphasized the urgency to complete the Post Crisis Needs Assessment (PCNA) for Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa/FATA and also ensure that the plan ‘builds back better’, takes cognizance of early recovery needs and addresses the key drivers of conflict.
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For further information and media assistance, please contact,
Mehreen Saeed, Communication Analyst, UNDP Pakistan
UN House No. 12, Street 17, F-7/2 Islamabad, Pakistan
Tel: +92-51-8355650 or Email:
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Website: http://www.undp.org.pk
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