NATIONAL GENDER POLICY FRAMEWORK

“Women are immensely contributing in different walks of life and playing an

important role in the economic activity, emphasizing their role also needs to
be recognized,” former federal minister for planning Asad Umer Federal
Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Asad Umar
announced the launch of the National Gender Policy Framework on the
occasion of International Women’s Day.

"Our country cannot progress unless the women are educated," Asad Umer.

National Gender Policy Framework: A step forward for women empowerment in

Pakistan
This creation of the NGPF document is an important step to address gender
challenges in society. Almost 50 percent of Pakistan’s population is women and
effective contributions of this segment of the society can put the country on the
avenues of development.  It is reported that the national labor value in Pakistan’s
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) can be increased by 27 percent by increasing
female labor force participation to 50 percent while completely closing the gender
gap can boost the national GDP by 30 percent i.e. USD 85.2 billion. Therefore, the
establishment of the NGPF is the need of the hour.

Challenges:

Pakistan also faced a challenge on the education front. "Enrollment of girls in

schools is very low as compared to boys and the dropout rate is increasing
with each passing day," Asad umer.
Main focus in NGPF:

The NGPF document is mainly focusing on six areas:

 governance;
 equality and quality in education,
 employment and economic empowerment;
 political participation and meaningful engagement;
 safety and security and,
 health and well-being.

Multiple policy measures and interventions are suggested for each of these areas so
that effective results can be achieved.

Other proposed policy actions:

 Many interesting policy actions are proposed such as: 

 gender-equal institutional transformation,
 promoting equitable access to work opportunities,
 creating avenues for and advancing female leadership,
 and protecting and promoting female mental health among others. 

These policy measures are certainly curial for mainstreaming gender, limiting
gender gap and providing conductive working environment for sustainable growth
of the society

Effective implementation mechanisms and tools are key for the successful
implementation of the policy
Knowing the history of the country, Pakistan has been able to establish sound
public policies but actually failed to implement those policies with their true
spirits.  It is therefore desirable to have policy implementation scenarios and
expected implementation challenges and their intended solutions in hand. It is
essential to establish sophisticated monitoring and evaluation frameworks so as to
regularly assess the implementation progress of the NGPF.

It has also stated that quarterly evaluation meetings will be scheduled to observe
the implementation progress. Moreover, it has also claimed that PC is in line to
establish a new cell/section which will be dedicated for the implementation of the
NGPF.  For effective implementation of any public policy, it is needed that there
must be a regular communication among the stakeholders, especially there should
be a strong coordination among the implementing institutions.

The NGPF document must massively be distributed among the institutions across
the country so that the policy message of the document can be reached to everyone.
It is of the extreme importance to devise policy statements by the relevant ministry
and it must be shared and disseminated on a priority basis. One cannot expect
successful implementation unless the contents of policy documents are not reached
to everyone but they must be a complete understanding of the document.

Conclusion:

The NGPF is a commendable step taken by the government to address a major

issue in the society. It is a striking policy initiative to lessen the gender gaps and
ensure meaningful representations of women in public policy making and decision-
making process, and provision of conducive working environment to all for a
sustainable future.  However, time will define how effectively implementation of
the NGPF will take place.