Murad hosts development forum to evolve new uplift strategy

Naimat Khan

KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah in a high-level meeting held here at CM House has approved the arrangements of `Sindh Development Forum 2018 (SDF) with the slogan of `Partnership for development’ on March 28, 2018 at a local hotel.

The SDF would be attended by 19 country heads of different agencies such as World Bank, Asian Development Bank (ADB) UNDP, ILO Unicef, USAID, European Union, ACF, World Food Program, and others and a large number of leading diplomats. “This would be a big event and opportunity to evolve new strategy for development of Sindh and strengthen development partnership with national and international partners and donor agencies.

The meeting was attended by all the provincial ministers, chief secretary Rizwan Memon, Chairman P&D Mohammad Waseem and secretaries of all the departments.

Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said that the objective of the forum is to understand the state of development in the province, recognize development gaps, evolve the shared understanding of priorities between the government and development partners, and formulate common strategies for the development, to priorities to become guiding tool in ADP formulation and to launch new formulated strategies.

Chairman P&D Mohammad Waseem briefing the meeting said that the program comprises of three sessions. The first session would be plenary; it would introduce the forum’s objectives, set the context and orient participants about working groups. The second session comprises of deliberations and presentations by nine parallel working groups. The groups would converge for consolidating the recommendations and third and the final session is plenary in which thematic leads would present the sectarial recommendations.

Mr Waseem told the meeting that nine breakout sessions on different sectors such as agriculture & Food security, health; water, Sanitation & Municipal Services; Education; Energy & Infrastructure; Economic Growth, Private sector & PPP mode; Public Financial Management, Poverty reduction & Community Development.

There would be a panel discussion on state of play; success and challenges to date-what has worked, what has not worked and priorities for development assistance.

The chief minister has termed the forum as an opportunity to evolve new guideline for shaping up provincial economy, development and focused approach on the development gaps. He directed all the provincial ministers and secretaries to participants with the objective to extract something better for their respective sectors or departments.

At night, the Sindh government would host dinner followed by a music night for the guests at Mohatta palace.