Over the course of the past several weeks, People™ and IOM worked together to reach migrant communities in Pakistan with the aim provide financial assistance to 17000 Afghan refugees and help develop individual livelihoods.
People™ has been facilitating international organizations to conduct wide-ranging projects in Pakistan, many of them focusing on the health and the development sectors. Our services have been availed by major organizations that initially wanted to approach trusted professionals with capabilities to extend their reach all across Pakistan, with a network that would enable organizations to operate smoothly on the ground at various locations. Over the years that IOM has availed our services, the organization has been able to access vulnerable communities – the Afghan refugee community being one. The main objective of the project has been to locate, provide financial assistance to and enable the establishment of small-scale or household based businesses for Afghan migrants to financially support them and help settle in society – at the same time pushing growth and development of the country and making the economic environment more adaptable for refugee communities.
Recruiting Members and Disbursing Cash Grants
People™ recruited members for IOM who were sent to set initial camps in different localities including cities in the Baluchistan province, KPK, Sindh and in regions of Punjab to perform preliminary tasks. Our teams recently visited these areas to disburse cash grants to refugees enlisted by IOM to acquire financial support. In addition to the initial grants distributed – People™ also disbursed cash grants and provided training to individuals to establish and run small-scale businesses. Individual Livelihood Assistance was also provided to individuals to small-scale business holders from the community to help expand businesses locally.
Providing Training for the Individual Livelihood Assistance (ILA) Program Part of our work with IOM encompasses facilitating the ILA program – from its cash disbursement phase to the training of individual persons in the program – People™ remains involved until the completion of this program. We provide vocational, skills-based lessons to all migrants enrolled with us to receive training. We have been able to send trainers to many of these localities to conduct technical training in different areas including mechanical repairing, stitching and other manual or practical skills – to prepare learners to have the necessary skills and select their paths.
