PR No. 124 BISP Initiatives Islamabad

Finance Minister, Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar chaired a meeting regarding various new initiatives proposed by BISP here on Thursday. Chairperson BISP Marvi Memon and BISP management briefed the Finance Minister on the proposed updating of National Socio-Economic Registry (NSER) as well as the proposed new banking model of BISP. Senior officials of Ministry of Finance also attended the meeting.

The meeting was briefed on the various aspects of National Socio-Economic Registry and its linkage with various social sector initiatives. It was noted that in order to have a true assessment of the socio economic conditions of the people and to plan better for their uplift, it was important that the data is updated on a regular basis.

The meeting was informed that BISP database is the most reliable database on the socio-economic status of 27 million households across the country and is being employed by multiple social sector programmes of both federal and provincial governments. The database was completed in 2011 and there is now need to update it and convert it from a static registry to a dynamic one. The updating of data registry was therefore important with reference to providing targeted and better service delivery to BISP beneficiaries as well as for other social sector programmes. Chairperson BISP stated that BISP planned to update the NSER and to significantly improve the database in line with international standards.

Finance Minister was also briefed on the proposed banking model which aims to improve the service delivery through an interactive design and innovative approach to empower the beneficiaries of BISP. BISP plans to replace the current debit card system with biometric system under which beneficiaries will be able to draw their amounts by use of fingerprints only. The number of cash-out points will increase manifolds, thereby facilitating the beneficiaries all over the country. In addition, the new model is designed in line with the financial inclusion targets of Government of Pakistan and will reduce the costs for the exchequer.

Finance Minister appreciated the efforts of BISP for improving the service delivery to BISP beneficiaries and acknowledged the need for updating the NSER for the obvious reasons of obsolescence and minimizing the errors in the current data. The Minister directed BISP to make preparation for the updating the registry and to take a better approach towards the re-survey with a focus on making database more dynamic so that no deserving family is left out of the programme. He assured BISP of fullest support in providing better service delivery to millions of families.

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