RECORDER REPORT

LAHORE: The development strategy of Pakistan is not based on the promotion of human rights, says a study conducted by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan.

The study entitled: “Economy, Budget and Trade: A Human Rights Perspective” says that the human rights approach provides a framework based on accountability, transparency and participatory course of development. “In this paper, we are trying to see the main economic challenges and policy responses to deal with such issues in the perspectives of human conditions. Human rights perspective is a norms based evaluation of economic policy,” says Nadia Tahir and Wasim Saleem, co-authors of the paper.

The study has presented an overview of economic performance in 2015-16 through the lens of human rights in Pakistan. It has also analysed the federal and provincial budgets to throw some light on the pattern of allocations for 2016-17 and finally the study has reviewed Pakistan’s trade in the region, in particular, the largest neighbours, including China and India, to assess the prospects of peace and progress based on connectivity.

The paper has pointed out that the human development expenditure is a residual of other expenditures. As the tax structure targets ordinary consumption rather than privilege, the revenue envelop is not expanding the true potential.

“Education expenditure continues to hover around two percent of GDP and the health expenditure is less than one percent of GDP. The share of expenditure on food security in the budget has been declining and the ratio of expenditure on human security to national security is too low to take care of the needs of the population.”

It has emphasized that service delivery is the most effective at the local levels of governance but the provinces are reluctant to allow a decent flow of resources to the local level despite elections.