KARACHI: Pakistani Prime Minster Imran Khan on Monday launched the Kamyab Pakistan Program (KPP), a first of its kind government initiative under which microloans amounting to Rs 1.4 trillion (approximately $8.23 billion) will be disbursed to 3.7 million households.
Khan swept to power in 2018 on promises to eradicate poverty, create jobs and build an Islamic welfare state.
The Kamyab Pakistan Program has five components with loans for farming, setting up businesses, constructing homes, skills-based scholarships and health facilities. Financing under KPP will be extended to families with a cumulative average monthly income of up to Rs.50,000 per month. The program also aims to link low-income groups with banks through microfinance institutions.
“We are starting a landmark program in the history of Pakistan which would uplift the lives of poor people,” Khan said at a launch ceremony in Islamabad.
Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin said the government was adopting a “bottoms up approach” to empower the poor to improve their lives on a permanent basis.
“These people had no access to credit and were borrowing from people,” Tarin said, adding that with the help pf KPP, “our lower segment will start standing on their own feet within the next 3 years.”
“From every household an individual will be imparted technical training ... that will bring about a revolution.”
KPP will be rolled out in phased manner starting from the northern regions of Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Jamu and Kashmir, followed by the provinces of Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab and Sindh.
