By Rehan Khan Khushik
KARACHI.The progress on the activities of Sindh Flood Emergency Rehabilitation Project ( P&DD ) component is satisfactory and World Bank acknowledges that the overall progress made so far is quite impressive both from the timeline and quality of work viewpoint, said Mr. Shoaib Siddiqui ,senior advisor to the Bank, during a review meeting held here today on friday.
The meeting was chaired by Task Team leader WB Mr. Ahsen Tehsin and also attended by Mr. Rehan Hyder and Ms. Nihan Rafique from the World Bank while Mr. Ghulam Asghar Kanasro and Mr. Aslam Leghari represented the SFERP Project side.
The P& DD component includes roads network, water supply, livelihood and rescue service
Dr Abid, DG Rescue Service, during the review session informed that sixteen satellite stations on Indus highway(N-55), N-5 and M- 9 are complete and in the process of being fine-tuned. All these stations will become operational by August as the staff selected for handing these stations is being trained in Rescue 1122 Academy, Lahore. Ten district headquarters are 68% complete and would be handed over to Rescue Service for operations by December of the current year. Moreover, Ten hospital emergencies after refurbishment have been handed over to the concerned authorities, he added. He disclosed that at present six thousand calls dealing with emergencies are being attended by rescue on daily basis.
Mr. Ghulam Asghar Kanasro PD SFERP during the meeting informed that under livelihood program (Cash for Work program), almost two billion rupees have been disbursed so far and Rs 672 million are in the process of being disbursed for the rehabilitation of almost two thousand schemes to one lakh forty thousand community workers who worked to develop community infrastructure of their own villages. Out of these community workers 40% were female workers. All these workers were paid through mobile wallets making them bankable persons.
He further informed that Rehabilitation work on 114 water supply and 23 drainage schemes in districts of Sanghar, Umerkot, Badin, Mirpur khas and Shaheed Benazirabad is currently going on and physical progress made on these schemes is 63% so far. These schemes would also be completed by November this year against the timeline of January, 2025.Tenders for 261 new water supply and 134 drainage schemes in districts of Jamshoro, Dadu, Khairpur, Jacobabad, Naushero Feroz and Qambar Shahdadkot have been initiated for their rehabilitation.
The total length of road network to be rehabilitated in 19 districts is 821 kilometers and the physical progress made on these roads till now is 65%. The work on roads is expected to be completed in November,2024 ahead of timeline set for their completion which is May, 2025.
