The Palestine country office partnered successfully with the Arab Institute for Training and Research in Statistics (AITRS) in Amman to hold its first training workshop on “Integration of Population Issues into Palestinian Sectoral Development Plans (2011-2013)”. The training was related to the development of the Palestinian Sectoral Development Plans (2011-2013) as well as UNFPA’s upcoming programme cycle for the same period. Its objective was to enhance the technical skills and capabilities of national counterparts (planners, programmers and policymakers) who will be functionally involved the integration of population issues into national and sectoral development planning processes.
The workshop was opened by Ms. Barbara Piazza-Georgi, UNFPA Representative in the oPt, Dr. Haidar Furaihat, Director General of the Department of Statistics in Jordan and Member of the Board of Trustees of AITRS, and Mr. Fathy Alnusoor, Director General of AITRS.
The resource persons were:
- Dr. Abdul Aziz Farah (Sudan), ex-UNFPA Senior Regional Advisor on Population and Development Strategies.
- Dr. Tania Faour (Lebanon), Associate Professor of Population Studies – Lebanese University.
- Dr. Louay Shabaneh (Palestine), Chief Technical Advisor and Team Leader of Population and Development at UNFPA Country Office for Iraq.
- Mr. Awad Alshbol (Jordan), Assistant Secretary-General, High Council of Population in Jordan.
The training was rich in its trainers who were professional experts from different Arab countries, able to bring in new information and best practices. Theoretical and conceptual foundations, models, experiences, tools for results-based monitoring and evaluation were presented and discussed. AITRS provided excellent technical as well as administrative and logistical support.
Participants from the Ministry of Planning and Administrative Development, Ministry of Women’s Affairs, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Social Affairs, Ministry of Youth and Sports, Ministry of Labor and Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics were committed to go back with new information and models for integrating population issues in macro sectoral development plans, and how to project population needs and segments in future planning adopting results-based monitoring and evaluation approach.
Recommendations included: focusing on practical (applied) aspects based on the experiences of other countries in population issues; holding more specialized workshops on population integration in the sectoral plans; and extending and intensifying future workshops.
