Islamabad: The government has announced its decision to provide free-of-cost food carts, livestock, rickshaws and inputs for small enterprises to 200,000 families across the country under its ‘Ehsaas Amdan (Income) Programme’, a news source reported. Special Assistant o the Prime Minister (PM) on Poverty Alleviation and Social Safety Dr Sania Nishtar expressed her views on the matter.
To this effect, she stated that PM Imran Khan would inaugurate the programme on February 21. Under this programme, the executive is expected to provide small assets to people living under the poverty line. These assets include livestock worth PKR 60,000, rickshaws, agricultural inputs, food carts and related assets for setting up small enterprises.
Dr
Nishtar further stated that under the first phase of the
project, the
government would select
200,000 families from 23 districts of the four provinces; including 10 districts from
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP),
seven
from Balochistan and three each
from Punjab and Sindh.
The areas selected include:
• KP – Torghar, Upper Kohistan,
Lower Kohistan, Palas Kolai, Shangla, Dera Ismail Khan, North Wazistan, South
Wazistan,
and Tank
These
districts were chosen on the basis of human development, poverty and
food security levels. Dr Nishtar said that the Ehsaas Amdan Programme would
benefit 1.4
million people across the country.
To facilitate this measure, the government has reserved 60% quota for women and 30% for the youth. Moreover, the beneficiaries will also be provided vocational training in order to convert assets into economically-beneficial units. Moreover, the recipients will be offered the ‘Ehsaas interest-free loan’ scheme in order to acquire finance for their businesses.
