Karachi : On February 14th 2024, the Consulate-General of Japan in Karachi organized an ODA Press Tour in which a group of journalists from various media houses participated. The purpose of the ODA Press Tour was to increase the local media’s awareness on Japanese Government Assistance Projects and their initiatives in Pakistan, thereby informing the people of Pakistan about Japan’s contribution towards Pakistan’s development in various fields such as education, healthcare sector and human security. The journalists, accompanied by the Consulate staff, undertook a full-day tour, visiting three project sites in Karachi city.
These all projects were provided the Grant Assistance for Grassroots Human Security Projects (GGP). GGP is a grant scheme of the Japanese Government, for the development projects aimed at improving the social well-being of the people at the grassroots level. Japan has funded more than 400 projects in Pakistan under the GGP since 1989.
The first site visited was the Behbud Association Karachi, located in Clifton. They have been providing health services in different medical fields and also educational and vocational training centres for more than 50 years. Government of Japan is focusing not only on eradicating polio but also on TB. It is very important to cure it completely because TB is a communicable disease. However, treatment is often discontinued for a variety of reasons in developing countries including Pakistan. The building of Behbud’s TB clinic was provided by Japan in 2004 through GGP. In the second GGP for Behbud Association, we aimed to improve the environment in which the most vulnerable continue to receive TB treatment by replacing an old X-ray machine that had been in use for more than 10 years with state-of-the-art equipment. This new Japanese X-ray machine provided in 2023 is contributed to eradicate TB in Pakistan. The beneficiaries are over 6,000 including patients’ families.
The second site was the Karachi Vocational Training Centre (KVTC), located in DHA Phase 4. Through the GGP project overseen by the Consulate-General of Japan in Karachi, a modern transport vehicle for the intellectually challenged persons was provided to KVTC in 2019. Transport in Karachi was the biggest barrier to accessing education and vocational training for them. By providing KVTC with the new vehicle, Japan provided support to ensure equal access to education and vocational training for intellectually challenged persons in Karachi. The beneficiaries are 30 students per day.
The last site was the Karwan-e-Hayat Institute for Mental Health Care in Keamari. Karwan-e-Hayat has been at the forefront of psychiatric care and rehabilitation in Pakistan for more than 40 years. Mental health issues in Pakistan have been gaining attention in recent years because a large number of people reportedly suffer from mental illness.
However, Pakistan still has very few hospitals specializing in this area. The Government of Japan has provided 7 vehicles to Karwan-e-Hayat, which has long-standing careers in this field, to expand their mobile medical services and patient transportation. These vehicles provided by the GGP enabled to facilitate the increasing numbers of psychiatric patients who need care and treatment. Their mobile clinics are now held successfully in 42 locations in Karachi every month. Total project beneficiaries exceeded 7,500. At each site, journalists got an in-depth view of the projects and how they help the people of Karachi and beyond.
Following the press tour, there were reports on Japan’s development cooperation in newspapers and on television.
