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International Development: India and Pakistan

Answer

India DfID’s largest aid programme is to India, where we provided £245 million in 2005–06. All DfID’s support is aimed at reducing poverty, which as we know has many, inter-linked dimensions, including low levels of income, assets, literacy and well-being. DfID’s largest programmes in India are in education and health which have an indirect but very significant impact on economic opportunities for the poor. India is making impressive progress in growing its economy and reducing income poverty, and DfID contributes to this in a number of ways. Nationally, working with the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), DfID assists the Government of India to make their increasingly open trade regime deliver their potential for promoting sustainable growth and reducing poverty. In Orissa, one of the poorest states in India, DfID is working with the Government to improve the investment climate through measures such as simplifying regulations facing businesses. DfID supports several micro-finance programmes to promote access to credit and other financial services to poor people, both within India and in having better information about money transfer services for remittances from family and friends working abroad. DfID supports rural livelihoods programmes in Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Orissa, which are designed to improve economic opportunities for poor people through increasing access to markets and diversifying livelihoods in the agricultural and non-farm sectors. DfID supports governments and municipal authorities in Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh in efforts to improve urban management and the urban environment, particularly for poor people and slum-dwellers. Many aspects of these programmes will increase economic opportunities—e.g. by reducing the cost or time to fetch clean water, by improving roads to better link people, jobs and goods and services. There is also a local economic development component to these programmes, including business or skills training and grants for starting small businesses. DfID also assists the Governments of Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh with power sector programmes which are designed to improve efficiency and financial sustainability of the power sector in these states. Better-run services should reduce power outages and so remove a major constraint on firms’ productivity, increasing investment and jobs in a range of sectors. To increase educational opportunities, for the past two years DfID has been supporting the Indian Government’s flagship Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) universal elementary education programme, together with the World Bank and the European Commission. DfID’s commitment is £210 million over the five years 2003–04 to 2007–08. SSA is the central government’s prime vehicle for delivering on the universal primary education MDG and the 2002 constitutional amendment that made elementary education a fundamental right. The aim is to ensure that by 2015 all children in India are receiving eight years of basic education of acceptable quality, regardless of sex, caste, creed, family income or location. SSA is a priority for the Indian Government, who have greatly increased their funding of the programme in the past two years, in part funded by an earmarked tax. Large numbers of teachers are being recruited and trained, teaching and learning materials are in mass production, new schools and classrooms are under construction and there has been a huge drive to get children into school. Remarkable progress is being made:"enrolments for 2004–05 among the 6–14 years age group have reached 94 per cent (201 million children);""the number of out-of-school children has fallen from 25 million in 2003 to 13.5 million in march 2005;""drop out rates have fallen; and""strong progress has been made towards gender and social equity, including for scheduled caste children and children with disabilities." The remarkable progress with SSA is helping to ensure that all girls and boys in India can have the opportunity to complete a full course of primary education, though further large-scale investments in the primary education system are needed to achieve that. DfID and other UK government departments are also supporting the Indian Government to access information, ideas and experience from the UK and elsewhere in diverse areas of education and skills development. Increasing economic and education opportunities is recognised and appreciated by our partners in India and is set to remain a key part of our support to India. Pakistan DfID Pakistan became a fully devolved operation in Islamabad only at the beginning of 2005. It has agreed a country assistance grant programme worth £236 million with the Government of Pakistan for the period 2005–06 to 2008–09. Poverty reduction in all its many facets is the central focus of the programme, which operates under three major pillars: (a) income growth (including access to microfinance), (b) accountability of the state to its citizens (good and better governance) and (c) service delivery (including education, health and water and sanitation). DfID recently released the first £20 million tranche of the £85 million poverty reduction budget support programme to the Government of Pakistan. Among the indicators for the first year is a requirement for increased social sector spending by the Government. This increased money in the Government of Pakistan’s budget will have a national impact on improved education in Pakistan. In addition to this, 17 per cent of the recently approved devolved social services programme in Punjab (total value $220 million) will be spent in the education sector, with a significant emphasis on adult literacy, a major issue for Pakistan where over 40 per cent of the population is illiterate. The aim of the programme is to achieve progress on the millennium development goals related to poverty, gender, education, health, and water and sanitation, with the purpose being to strengthen devolved social services for more equitable, efficient and sustainable delivery of social services in Punjab. In direct education programming, we are providing £700,000 of funding to the National Education Assessment System, in collaboration with the World Bank. This programme is a government-led system of testing to establish quality of learning and the factors that influence that learning. Findings from the tests will help the Government of Pakistan better to address areas of concern in the education system, such as curriculum and teacher training, thereby improving the overall quality of the education system. DfID is actively supporting the Government of Pakistan’s Poverty Reduction Strategy, which focuses on increasing incomes and employment opportunities for the poor through sustained economic growth. DfID poverty reduction budget support is aimed at helping the Government of Pakistan achieve their targets of accelerating economic growth while providing adequate social safety nets for the marginalised. On economic opportunities for the poor, DfID is providing £20 million for increasing access to micro-finance through two large NGOs, the Kashf Foundation and Rural Support Programmes Network (RSPN). With DfID support, Kashf is targeting to increase its clients (mostly poor women) from 75,000 to 300,000 in five years. The RSPN programme provides micro-finance, social mobilisation and building small-scale infrastructure to improve livelihoods. DfID is also helping the Government of Pakistan to improve access to finance through analytical studies and information sharing on global best practices. The Government have asked us to support a household survey that would ascertain a baseline on access to financial services in Pakistan. As part of this programme, we recently submitted a report to the Government on the potential for increasing the level of remittances (mostly from the UK) to re-habilitate the earthquake affected household in Azad Jammu and Kashmir and the North West Frontier Province (NWFP). DfID is also helping to improve the enabling environment for investment and private sector development. In this connection, DfID is providing £12 million to support a tax administration reforms programme. The programme aims at improving the tax administration culture through automation, capacity building and reducing corruption. DfID is also supporting the development of a competition framework and investment climate assessment. In the Punjab province, DfID is helping the provincial government develop a vision for private sector development and creation of employment opportunities. The programme focuses on improved infrastructure, reduced barriers to business and improved communication networks. DfID is also considering a large programme to improve income growth opportunities in the poorer districts of Punjab and NWFP.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

5209; 681 c79-82WA

Session

2005-06

Subjects

Development aid Education Economic situation India Poverty Pakistan

Contains statistics

Yes

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk