Dr. Rai Qamar-uz-Zaman
Health Officer North Zone
Municipal Corporation,
Faisalabad, Pakistan

1. Status of Progress toward Target Set at ICPD in Faisalabad

Since its birth in 1947 as an independent country, Pakistan like other developing countries of the third world could not make much progress in the fields of education, health, population planning and economics. Our 50-year history is a story of successes and failures. We have owned the world's largest earth filled dam, but unfortunately, could not improve the fortune of 5,000 years old Indus civilization. About 60% of Pakistanis do not have the facilities of clean drinking water, out of 1,000, 86 babies die soon after birth, whereas 5-6 mothers die during labor, 68% of Pakistanis are illiterate. Half of our kids do not have effective opportunity to even go to a primary school. We could not have any effective controls on the population explosion, as in last 50 years our population has grown four times. Our population in 1947 was 30 million which is now above 130 million.This population explosion has not only nullify our socio-economic achievements but also has added many problems like unemployment, political unrest, terrorism, ethnic uprisings etc.

Faisalabad was a small town of about 70 thousands people in 1947. Due to rapid urbanization,industrialization trends, especially the growth of textile industry in the city, it has grown now, according to 1998 census, into the third largest city of Pakistan with a population of 1,986,000. This rapid population growth has given rise to mushroom growth of kachi abadies, ill/self planned residential colonies, poor housing conditions,poor solid waste management system and sewerage system. We could not control the infant mortality rate, the maternal mortality rate etc. As far as the index of education is concerned, the situation is not appreciable as targets are far behind from the other developing countries.

		1996	1997	1998
Infant Mortality Rate		98.0	92.0	86.0
Life expectancy at birth	Male	59.4	59.6	59.6
	Female	58.1	58.2	58.4
Maternal Mortality Rate		6.8	6.2	5.9

		1996	1997	1998
Enrollment ratio in primary education	Male	54.4	55.1	55.4
	Female	48.6	49.7	50.5
Percentage of children completing primary	Male	50.1	50.4	50.8
	Female	44.2	44.4	44.6
Enrollment ratio in secondary education	Male	38.2	38.3	38.6
	Female	33.1	33.4	33.4
Illiteracy rate of people over 15 years old	Male	48.0	47.7	47.5
	Female	65.1	64.8	64.7

	1996	1997	1998
Percentage of people with knowledge of family nlannincr	93.0	94.0	95.5
Percentage number of birth by females aged 15 to 19 (per 1,000 persons)	14.0	13.6	13.2
Percentage of contraceptive use	26.4	28.9	30.0

2. Status of Implementation of ICPD Action Programmes in Faisalabad

ICPD Action Programmes are the comprehensive charter of population development based on international cooperation. It gives the opportunity to adopt suitable macro and socio-economic policies to promote sustained economic growth as well as human development.

As regards the implementations of these action plans in the city of Faisalabad, the situation is not very much encouraging. Although the city government has adopted a number of policies and has started many short term and long term plans, the overall response and the status of implementation is poor. This is mainly because of the following factors.

1. Lack of infrastructure
2. High rate of illiteracy
3. Rapid urbanization
4. Poor coordination between different public sector and government organization
5. Lack of training facilities and the staff
6. Scanty funds
7. Social and religious factors

However, few positive steps have been taken by the government as regards the implementation of these action plans.

Local bodies' elections held during this year, where the people are given the right to vote, on one person one vote basis. These representatives run the city government through the Municipal Corporation. Being a conservative society, although officially given equal rights, social and family factors inhibit and the women do not contest in these elections, so they have got no representation in general elections and local government.However, some seats are reserved, where the women are elected and get some representation indirectly. Our male dominant social set-up does not allow the women to participate in decision making and to hold other key positions in the city government. They have got far less job opportunities than men, because of their gender, but still a reasonable number of women are working in our education, health and population welfare departments.Women are also working in garments industry.

Joint family system is participated in our city, which has many advantages as well as disadvantages.The most pinching disadvantages is that usually the people do not plan their families which results in increasing poverty, child labor and other social evils. Female child is taken as a burden and not given proper attention and equivalent status. Mothers are malnourished. There are no proper antenatal care facilities. Births are handed by Traditional Birth Attendant (TEA); who are usually untrained and use the primitive methods. This leads to increase infant as well as maternal mortality rates. Multiple pregnancies and number of children is also affecting the reproductive health of mothers.

Faisalabad has grown very rapidly due to industrialization, especially the textile and related industries.This has created a trend of rapid urbanization and internal migration. This has created a lot of problems, like ill planned housing, poor sanitary conditions, pollution, lack of provision of basic facilities e. g. pure water supply,proper living conditions etc. As such there is no international migration to Faisalabad city, however, about 50,000 people from here have migrated to Europe, USA and the oil rich Middle East states.

3. Current Situation and Problems of Family Planning, Maternal and Child Health

Faisalabad is one of the most rapidly growing cities of Pakistan. Some of the problems regarding family planning, maternal and child health are as follows:

1. Lack of awareness among the women about the methods of family planning
2. People are hesitant to adopt the usual methods of family planning
3. The service provided by the family planning and population welfare department are poorly organized
4. Lack of effective NGO* s working for family planning
5. Poverty and illiteracy are responsible for malnutrition, substandard living conditions, communicable disease, multiple pregnancies, lack of ante and post natal care, which all contribute to reproductive health problems and increased maternal and infant mortality rates.

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