LAHORE: As many as 58.7 million people in Pakistan are living in multidimensional poverty with 46 percent of rural population and 18 percent of urban households falling below the poverty line, says a survey report.
The report titled “Clustered Deprivation” is prepared by the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) with the financial and technical assistance of United Nation Development Programme (UNDP).
The SDPI measures poverty on the basis of five dimensions - education, health, water supply and sanitation, household assets/amenities and satisfaction to service delivery.
Further, a person taking less than 2,350 calories per day and earning less than $1.25 per day according to the United Nations standard has also been regarded as living below the poverty threshold.
In Punjab, higher incidence of poverty was observed in southern districts.
Siberian ducks
found dead
HARIPUR: Dozens of migratory birds have been found dead at Tarbela Lake in northern Pakistan. Wildlife Department officials suspect the birds might have consumed something poisonous.
The figures, however, are contested. While the Wildlife Department claims only six Siberian ducks have been found dead, residents say the figures ran in double digits or more.
Dildar Khan, an Afghan national living in a nearby refugees camp, told journalists that he saw dozens of dead birds on the banks of the lake near Khalabat Township Sunday afternoon and informed the wildlife authorities.
A local farmer said he saw nearly a hundred dead birds. He believes they were poisoned by someone who was trying to scare them off so they stayed away from his wheat crop on the reclaimed land.
Tarbela Lake in Haripur is the largest lake in the country and serves as a temporary habitat for migratory birds.
Abducted officials freed
Islamabad: The Pakistani police yesterday morning managed to free the security personnel and health officials who were kidnapped during an armed attack on the convoy of the Deputy Commissioner of Awaran in Balochistan in southwestern Pakistan on Tuesday.
Police said that a raid was conducted on a tip-off at ‘Qasmi Jo’ area in Awaran where three security personnel and two health officials were freed. However, the kidnappers successfully escaped from the scene.
Sensitive sites trespassed
KARACHI: At least 10 foreigners Italian and French carrying out surveys and excavation works in and around Bhanbhore located in a sensitive and extensive creek system of the Indus delta in southern Pakistan have completed their around six-week-long work without any security clearance from various government agencies amid a confusion among the government officials whether the foreigners needed a clearance or not, sources here say.
According to sources, these foreigners were working under a licence issued last year by the then Sindh antiquities department (SAD), which has now been merged with the Sindh culture department (SCD).
A top SAD official said that no security clearance was required while a top SCD official with a vast experience with such matters said the security clearance was a must for foreigners. AGENCIEs
