The government is taking concrete measures for promoting education in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) where literacy rate has increased to 33.3 percent.
According to FATA Development Indicator Household Survey report (FDIHS, 2013-2014), released recently, 11.8 per cent of FATA youth aged 15-24 are unemployed.
The survey has been carried out by the Bureau of Statistics, FATA Secretariat with a tripartite arrangement between, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics and the Institute of Management Sciences, Peshawar, with the financial support of Governance Support Project FATA-Multi Donor Trust Fund.
It says there are, gender difference in the literacy rate, with 49.7 percent males in FATA are registered literate against 12.7 per cent females.
About the health, water and sanitation data, the report says only 8.9 percent of estimated population have access to piped drinking water while 38.3 per cent of FATA households have flush latrines. Only 6.3 percent houses have underground drainage system and only 29.5 per cent of births were attended by skilled health personals.
Moreover, the report says 0.7 percent children (age 2-9) have at least one disability in overall FATA furthermore 71.8 percent of its people use radio as source of information.
During this exercise, 4,070 household were surveyed, all the agencies and frontier regions were included except North Waziristan and parts of Orakzai and Khyber agencies because of the security situation.
This report having more than 50 development indicators also shows the comparison of FATA data with national and provincial status.
The objectives of the survey is to make available quality and reliable data and statistics on key development and socio economics parameters to FATA planners and policy makers and importantly the capacity development of the Bureau of Statistics and FATA Secretariat for conducting future studies.
Before, 1998 census was the only source for the development planning baseline, the absence of any reliable data prompted FATA Secretariat to launch an initiative for conducting the FDIHS 2013-14.
The data will be used as baseline for development planning of FATA.
