It hurts me to mention that the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics estimates that the unemployment rate in Balochistan is 4 percent. The reason that unemployment rises is due to lack of awareness about the facts, Poverty, a lack of government’s interest toward providing opportunities to its youth, and a poor education system.
Undoubtedly, Government jobs are the only source of employment in the province. In the past, due to less population and a few numbers of educated citizens made the government jobs were easy to be hired for but later at the current times the population has exceeded so high, and literacy is rising. So according to the situation the job opportunities need to be more than before, but they are not. The province did not receive its share in mega projects like Gwadar Port, the Sandak project, and the Reko Diq.
However, the development funds for Balochistan should be used for agriculture, irrigation, fisheries, mining, forestry, and livestock because much of the population is dependent on these sectors for their survival. Mainly educated youths are jobless so such a policy for lessening unemployment in the province can be effective unless the real problem of unemployment is systematically understood.
Moreover, the Policymakers and those who sit at the helm of public policy affairs must realize that a vast number of unemployed people are the uneducated farmers, animal raisers, and fishermen in the coastal belt of the province. It is important to mention that only 1.5 million families live in Balochistan. Compared to other provinces of Pakistan and given the extreme population pressure in the country, the small population in Balochistan can be considered an asset, as one job per family, it needs 1.5 million jobs to provide a family.
Thus, mass unemployment, mass poverty, high illiteracy, and inescapable and persistent hunger are incompressible and inexcusable, full of natural resources and rich minerals which are under the grip of widespread unemployment, poverty, and marginalization. Beyond redemption, that caused Balochistan to reflect and suffer from a resource curse that has serious and adverse implications on unemployment.
Hani Khalil,
Turbat.