DI KHAN: The district social welfare department is taking steps to empower women economically by promoting their crafts that will help entrepreneurs in a great way, says the district social welfare officer Shah Zaman.
Talking to media, the social welfare officer said the provincial government was fully appreciating the role of the womenfolk who constituted about half of country’s population, towards the national socio-economic development and planning to open more handicraft centers to augment their role in this regard.
As part of such efforts, Shahzaman said a handicraft centre had recently been opened in Meran area of the district recently, adding it was well-equipped institution to hone skills of women artisans of the area for getting decent earnings.
He said that centre was also aimed to empower women through promoting their traditional handicraft of the district- already known for the hand-made stuff and recognized by entrepreneurs.
He was of the view that efforts should be made for creating awareness among women besides providing them access to micro-credit facilities because such factors played crucial role in enterprise development, which was presently not at satisfactory level, the social welfare officer added.
He said that there were various factors, which undermined and thwart women’s participation towards mainstream of national development by restricting their access to labour market.
He said more measures were needed to be taken for reaching out to women especially those living in remote rural areas because presently their role was very limited which led to discrimination, slow economic growth, higher incidence of poverty and lower standard of living.