RIPORT’s Capacity Building Project in Public Policy Research

NWFP and the tribal areas have a combined population of about 25.5 million. During the past the region had become ungovernable due to multiple reasons but one of the main reasons is the breakdown of institutions and absence of appropriate public policies to meet the challenges. Though much is being done by the government, yet there is an acute shortage of institutions generating alternate policies in the social and economic fields.

The region has some of the poorest development indicators with one of the highest poverty levels in the country. The deficit in research and policy planning related to governance compounds the problems. Secondly, the stock of research capacity in civil society is not being replenished to replace the few gifted individuals in this field which the province and tribal areas possess.

To move forward in the area of policy formulation it is essential to continuously research and test hypotheses in the field of public policy. The issues and problems must be tested and researched in the current atmosphere in order to create new policies based on the ground realities and the changing environment.

In order to fill this gap RIIPORT undertook a research program in collaboration with Asia Foundation Islamabad to fill the research deficit. RIPORT’s aim is to produce a core group of policy researcher who would be trained in basic techniques of research methodologies, which will not only give NWFP a pool of quality researchers but their researches will also help to produce viable alternate policies. In this regard three batches of researchers have been trained so far by RIPORT, whose research reports has been issued and made public trough workshops and print media. The research topics are;

1.      Price Hike and its impacts on household incomes in some localities of District Peshawar.

2.      Is there a decline in Industrial production, wages and employment in Hayatabad Industrial Estate Peshawar?

3.      Effectiveness of Basic Health Services provided in rural and urban areas of District Peshawar.

With the capacity build during the last year, the fourth batch of RIPORT is currently working on two more research reports where they are assessing,

1.      The conditions of Afghan Refugees currently living in NWFP.

2.      The Research Capacity of educational institutes in Peshawar.

It is also pertinent here to point out that RIPORT has recently been registered by the HEC (Higher Education Commission) Pakistan as a Research Center, the only of its kind in development sector in Peshawar.

Project Context

Educational institutions in NWFP, particularly the University of Peshawar produce graduate whose research skills in key areas like economics, sociology anthropology, International Relations and Pakistan Studies are in need of up gradation to be able to fully utilize their knowledge. Therefore it is proposed to teach methodology to post graduate scholars and others so as to create a critical mass of researchers in the field of policy research.

Project Goal

“The goal of this project is to teach research methodology in public policy, dealing with security, development and governance in NWFP, Fata and the region. The project will create a pool of personnel who would provide research helping in driving the reform agenda forward.”

Other objectives:

The project activities will help;

1. To identify potential research associates
2. To identify issues and problems related to policy and governance issues,
3. To research issues and problems pertinent for solving current policy challenges
4. To increase the stock of researchers
5. To improve research skills in the region
6. To undertake joint research in SAARC

Project highlights:

1.      Each research cycle has duration of four months. There are three training cycles per year.

2.      Each cycle train 6 research associates.

3.      Each cycle will result in production of two research studies now.

4.      New areas of research are identified continuously

5.      Research support is provided to Prov. Assembly, BOS, SMEDA and FATA as well as FDA.

6.      New policy recommendations are regularly made available to government and the public.