LAHORE: The Centre for Public Policy and Governance (CPPG), Forman Christian College Lahore held a two day training for the Department of Social Welfare and Bait-ul-Maal Punjab (SWD) from April 20-21, 2017.

The training was part of a larger project titled “Social Welfare Department: The Provincial Face of Regulation and Interaction with NGOs” being conducted by CPPG with the support of the USAID Small Grants and Ambassador’s Fund Programme.

The training on “Local Government and the Social Welfare Department” was organised and delivered by CPPG project research team and faculty. The event spanned over two days and six sessions – which covered aspects such as the evolution of local government in the province and its potential impact on the structure and functioning of the Social Welfare Department (SWD), as well as a number of others. The training was attended by SWD officers and the director and deputy directors from all over Punjab.

At the conclusion of the event FC College Rector Dr James Tebbe distributed certificates among the participants and praised them saying, “The work you do is vital for our society and I hope that the continuing education that you receive here is valuable to you”.

The distribution ceremony was also attended by CPPG Founding Director and Professor Dr Saeed Shafqat and SWD Director Waheed Ansari – who was deeply appreciative of the efforts of the CPPG team in the work that they had done during the course of project. While speaking about the training conducted he said, “I hope that this is the start of a long partnership between these two institutions for many such capacity development workshops and I am very thankful to them for all their work."

"The CPPG strongly believes and is constantly striving to build the capacity and improve skills of the Punjab government officials by conducting such trainings. This would not be possible without the support and cooperation of the department," said CPPG Founding Director Dr Saeed Shafqat while concluding the event.

CPPG Research Project Team members Maheen Saleem Khosa, Rafat Malik and Muhammad Hassan besides Dr Imdad Hussain, CPPG Senior Research Fellow Raheem-ul-Haque, Dr Raja Ali Saleem, Fawad Bajwa and others participated in the training sessions.