New payment method to secure and expand avenues of investment and saving for BISP beneficiaries: Marri.

KARACHI -- 'A new payment method to secure and expand avenues of investment and saving for BISP beneficiaries.'

Federal Minister for Poverty Alleviation and Social Safety and Benazir Income Support Program (BISP)- Chairperson Shazia Atta Marri, while speaking at a Press Conference highlighted that the focus of the Conference would be on BISP. The conference was to lay focus on the introduction of a new payment mechanism for BISP.

BISP got its legal framework in 2010 with all its legislations and a legal status. Pakistan is a developing nation, however, with its economic challenges, Pakistan still has a unique program like BISP. It's the most popular in the region, and also revered in the UN on a global level. BISP currently facilitates and benefits above 8 million families.

A new Payment mechanism is in need of adoption, program started in 2010, back when money order was the way to transfer funds. Then it moved to pilot program mechanism, that initiated the Benazir debit card. Moving on and rectifying the flaws of the debit card system, in 2016 a biometric verification was piloted and officially launched. With its pros, came the cons and we faced extreme challenges during the floods, the role of middleman, delayed payments, no concept of saving as all the money must be extracted at the same time. With all these loopholes, and increasing challenges for women to extract payments through biometric verification method, Madam Shazia Marri and her team decided to devise a method to undo the previous payment structures and devise a plan that will work. Through this program, women who are direct beneficiaries of BISP, can now be empowered. She can be an owner of a bank account in her own capacity. She can manage savings, she can use the finances to initiate any business prospect. This method not only brings about financial literacy, but also ensures social inclusion of millions of women, benefiting from BISP.

For this new mechanism to work, the Federal Minister stated that there will first be a pilot program, along with a few Banks in different regions, on a small scale, to test whether it can be sustained as a full fledged program. The expansion won't be overnight, it will be taken up only after the pilot is run, and whatever necessary inadequacies that may arise while it's put in place, they must be rectified in the final plan.

BISP has long been known to encourage individuals to move towards registering and making CNICs, that were a prerequisite...