The status of women in Pakistan is worsening day by day and their living standard is also decreasing abysmally. Women in Pakistan do not only suffer from domestic inequalities in terms of the distribution of resources but their access to outside resources like education and employment is minimal and support from government or non-governmental organizations is nominal. Patriarchal structures embodied in kinship, religion, division of labour, violence and class hierarchy have further reinforced subordination of women and their dependence on men. The inability of state to fulfil basic needs of people has increased the number of poor women in the country. This study attempts to present an analysis on the plight of women and widening gender inequalities being reinforced by patriarchal set up and norms in Pakistani society. The analysis is done in the light of two main analytical frameworks: Women in Development (WID) and Gender and Development (GAD). The methodology applied for the study is qualitative. The study concludes that until gender inequalities are removed, women would continue to suffer from subjugation in Pakistan; therefore, state should adopt more gender sensitive human development policies and ensure women's representation and participation in all the crucial domains.

The paper attempts to analyze the impact of the economics of austerity in the form of structural adjustment programmes singed by government with IMF during 1988with IMF during -2002 To assess the impact of SAP on the vital macroeconomic indicators, the paper has adopted qualitative and quantitative research methodology while collecting data from different sources, including State Bank of Pakistan. This paper assesses the social impact of IMF conditionalities on health, education in addition to social consequences of privatization and withdrawal of subsidy. It has been deduced from the data that there has been major reduction on the expenditure on health and education as a result of cuts on healthcare and education as certain portions of the budget such as the defense, debt servicing and government salaries are fixed and the cut in the budget translates into cut in social sector expenditure which eventually impacted on health, education and other relevant sectors of the economy. This had have negative implications for the quality of services provided in education, curative health care and provision of medicines, largely due to protecting recurring budgets in the face of cutbacks. Education is an important sector of economy since it is a key component of the strategy for sustainable development and the best way to build a modern and coherent community. Cuts in educational expenditures had worst consequences for both the quality and quantity of education provided to students. Governments in the past had reacted by reducing education budget which resulted in decline in real education expenditure per student. Hence cut in education expenditure affects both the quality and quantity of education provided to the population by any government and can be linked directly to structural adjustment programs. The other area that produced negative social consequences during adjustment period is the privatization. Though IMF saw privatization as panacea to the economic woes of Pakistan, it failed to produce the desired results. From 1991 to 2006 the GOP privatized more than 160 public units at gross price of Rs. 395 billion and about 0.6 million workers were rendered jobless as a result of neo-liberal IMF (SAP) policies.

Purpose - The study explores and evaluates the women's experiences with microcredit facility for the purpose of women empowerment. While there is a mutual understanding and consensus on closer nexus between women empowerment and microcredit, women are disempowered for a variety of reasons such as lacks of financial resources, being a member of patriarchy society, misinterpreted religious concepts about her role and position in the society, and cultural restraints. However, microcredit, globally promoted as a “miracle cure” for the financially weak, especially women who face so many problems accessing microcredit for a variety of reason, which have been discussed in detail in this study. Methodology/Sample - This is qualitative study with inductive approach, and interpretive philosophy which allow the existence of multiple subjective perspectives and construction of knowledge. Women who availed microcredit from microfinance institutions (MFIs) were selected for the research study. The data was congregated through in-depth interviews and stopped at saturation level. Through phenomenological analysis, women lived experiences were analyzed. Findings - The results indicate that microcredit strengthens women in all dimensions but plays more influential role when they are provided with autonomous access to microcredit, support from family, and facilities from MFIs. Needless to say that the multidimensional women's stability contributes in alleviating feminization of poverty and this is not a social issue but the global dilemma now days. Practical Implications - This research is significant for the microfinance practitioners to design policies for promoting women entrepreneurship and for MFIs to facilitate their contemporary women clients with trainings and efficient supervision.

China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is a massive investment initiative by China with a whopping amount of $62 billion. The project includes various short term and long term plans for energy, infrastructure, IT and R&D projects. The completion of short term plans by the end of 2018 and initiation of long term projects demand a comprehensive analysis as the project of CPEC presents both threat and opportunities for local producers. The threats include competition for local producers from innovative products of China and technological and managerial superiority of Chinese companies over Pakistani industry. However, the domestic producers feel more optimist as energy and infrastructure projects, and induction of new technology would benefit the business sector in Pakistan. The purpose of this study is to explore and identify the possible threats and opportunities considering “Infant Industry Theory” as an analytical framework. A qualitative and quantitative research methodology is employed and the data is gathered from 20 divergent and potential sector of SMEs through a close ended survey questionnaire. The likert scale is used to evaluate the opinions of respondents for awareness, challenges; and threats and opportunities of CPEC. The results revealed that SMEs owners are now more aware about the CPEC and its related details while the major challenges for producers were to cope with the low access to finance, unavailability of business and legal advisory services and difficulties in market access. Moreover, the majority of selected respondents consider the project of CPE as an opportunity for their businesses, industry and economy of Pakistan. It is thus concluded that business sector in Pakistan is preparing for CPEC, but with the fact that the required results are not possible till the challenges and concerns of local producers are addressed by the government in appropriate way through effective policies and efficient management. Hence, a detailed policy plan for the local industry specifying CPEC is highly recommended.

Poverty is a crucial and worldwide phenomenon. The main purpose of the study is to investigate the relationship exists between socio-economic factors, social factors, and poverty, the relative influence of economic and social factors on poverty and to describe causality between time series in the VAR system. This study utilized the Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) by using quarterly time-series data, 1994Q1 to 2018Q4, that have been collected from the world development indicators (WDI) and Economic Survey of Pakistan. The study identified education, unemployment, inflation as economic factors while zakat and rainfall as social factors that can reduce poverty. The findings of this study indicate that inflation and unemployment have a positive and significant relationship with poverty in the long run in Pakistan while education, rainfall, social welfare programs, and zakat has a negative relationship in the long run with poverty. Besides, the study also found that in the short run, there is no relationship between economic and social factors with poverty. Moreover, the study found that in the long run that the relative contribution of education and rain increases, 28% and 20%, is greater than the contribution of inflation, social welfare programs, unemployment and zakat, 3.8%, 0.5%, 2.5%, and 0.08%. Similarly, its contribution to poverty reduces up to 44% in the long run. This study helps policymakers to take important decisions about economic and social factors while designing policies to reduce poverty. The results suggest that the state bank of Pakistan should adopt a contractionary monetary policy to control inflation and policymakers can develop policies like education for all. The government should develop a business environment to create more employment opportunities.