akistan’s education system has long been affected by poverty, inequality, and disparities in public service access, resulting in millions of children, particularly girls, being out of school despite constitutional assurances. In the past decade, social protection measures have become increasingly important to tackle this issue, often linking cash assistance to school enrollment, attendance and retention.

With a growing range of federal and provincial programmes such as Benazir Taleemi Wazaif, the Workers Welfare Fund, Zewar-i-Taleem, Honhaar Laptop Scholarship (2026), School Meal Programme (2026), Sindh’s Accelerated Action Plan and Student Voucher System, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Insaf Female Education Card (2026), and Balochistan’s Awami Endowment Fund and Alternative Learning Centres, social protection has shifted from only providing short-term poverty relief to serving as a tool for human development, covering areas like education, health, and gender equality.

While these initiatives have successfully increased enrollment, they still face challenges in ensuring long-term learning, skill acquisition, and social mobility due to persistent problems with funding, infrastructure and coordination.

For millions of low-income families, school costs have long been a daily challenge that often decides whether a child can learn or must work. Expenses such as uniforms, transportation, and books, as well as potential income lost, frequently lead parents to withdraw their children from school, especially girls. Social protection measures, like cash transfers, have alleviated these financial pressures, helping families keep their children enrolled and attend school more consistently. At the family level, social protection is transforming education from a fragile opportunity into a more sustainable one, particularly for those near the poverty line.

This shift has been implemented through conditional cash transfers that explicitly connect financial aid to specific education-related actions. Payments are made only if children are enrolled, maintain certain attendance levels, and advance through grades, thereby providing a direct incentive for families. Verification is usually done via school records and administrative oversight, tying social protection directly to the education system. By embedding conditions in cash assistance, the government has moved from a passive welfare model to an accountability-focused approach aimed at enhancing educational outcomes on a large scale.

At the federal level, this approach is most evident in large-scale safety net programmes that serve millions of low-income households nationwide. Educational components integrated into national social protection efforts are designed to maintain school attendance and combat intergenerational poverty. Through consistent financial assistance linked to children’s education, the federal government has established education as a fundamental entitlement, rather than an optional benefit, within its comprehensive social welfare system.

In addition to federal efforts, provincial governments have launched their own social protection initiatives focused on education, tailored to local needs and disparities. These measures include stipends, education vouchers, school meal programmes, and digital learning support, aiming to fill gaps left by national schemes while addressing issues such as access, gender inequality, and regional deprivation.

Examples include girls’ stipends in the Punjab, education vouchers for private-school enrollment in Sindh, school meals to boost attendance, and digital support schemes in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which showcase both innovation and inconsistent implementation. Collectively, these provincial efforts demonstrate that educational outcomes increasingly depend not only on household poverty but also on each province’s governance capacity.

Although there have been noticeable improvements in enrollment and attendance, social protection’s impact on education is still limited by deep-rooted structural issues. A significant number of children drop out after primary school due to a lack of nearby middle and secondary schools, especially for girls in rural areas. Ongoing underinvestment in education, fragmented data systems, and weak monitoring further reduce the effectiveness of cash transfers, showing that financial incentives alone cannot address deficiencies in infrastructure, quality, and resource governance.

As Pakistan moves towards a social protection-focused human development model that covers basic education, health and nutrition, gender equality, and breaks intergenerational poverty, the main challenge is turning short-term school attendance into meaningful learning and opportunities. This will require better coordination between social protection and education systems, improved school infrastructure, and significantly increased public funding. Without these reforms, the potential of conditional cash transfers may only improve enrollment rates, failing to deliver the essential progress in skills, equity, and social mobility that the country urgently needs.

Social protection programmes have effectively increased access and early enrollment. However, their influence reduces as students move beyond primary school. Early successes mask underlying system issues, such as limited infrastructure, teacher shortages, and inconsistent institutional capacity, which hinder sustained progress.

This reveals a key limitation: while these programmes promote initial participation, they alone cannot guarantee the sustainability of ongoing engagement, the quality of educational outcomes, or equity in education outcomes.

The core issue highlighted in the Sustainable Development Policy Institute baseline (2025) is the persistent “middle school gap,” driven by deep-rooted gender disparities and regional inequalities. While primary school enrollment has increased, the lack of middle and secondary schools, especially for girls, still causes many students to drop out after Grade 5. This issue is exacerbated by chronic underfunding, as Pakistan allocates just 0.8 percent to 1.5 percent of GDP to education, far below the recommended 4 to 6 percent.

Administrative issues also hinder progress: fragmented data systems and the lack of a unified national registry lead to duplication and leave around 2.2 million vulnerable households out of the National Socio-Economic Registry. Additionally, social protection initiatives have increased the demand for education without matching the growth in supply, as school infrastructure, teacher quality, and learning materials often lag behind. These problems are especially acute in underserved areas like South Punjab, Sindh, and Balochistan, where poor facilities, limited outreach, and weak monitoring deepen the rural–urban gap.

To address these gaps, a decisive transition from fragmented efforts to a unified national approach is essential, one that aligns social protection with education planning and service delivery. Increasing infrastructure for middle and secondary schools, especially for girls, must be accompanied by higher public investment in education and enhanced provincial capacity. Additionally, integrating data systems, including a single national registry, is crucial to efficiently reach the most vulnerable households without duplication. Only with these reforms can social protection advance from merely increasing enrollment to fostering a resilient education system that promotes skills development, equity, and long-term social mobility.

In conclusion, Pakistan’s increasing dependence on social protection signifies a notable shift from short-term aid to long-term human development. Conditional cash transfers have proven effective in encouraging children, particularly girls from deprived families to attend school, alleviating immediate economic hardships that cause exclusion. However, sustaining these achievements requires addressing ongoing structural issues like underfunding, inadequate school infrastructure, data fragmentation, and regional disparities.

Without sufficient investment, effective governance, and access to quality education, the impact of social protection will stay limited. Ultimately, success should be measured not merely by enrollment numbers but by whether children can learn, develop skills, and break free from the cycle of poverty that has affected previous generations.

The writer is part of the Systems Research Group at the Sustainable Development Policy Institute in Islamabad, Pakistan. The article does not necessarily reflect theorganisation’s official stance. He can be reached at [email protected].His X handle: @kazmi_m