Selangor To Introduce Free Sanitary Pad Programme With Budget 2023 To Help Aid Period Poverty

By Quinny Tan  •  01 Dec 2022 in News

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Selangor’s state Budget 2023 of RM2.45 billion will be introducing a free sanitary pad programme.

Bukit Melawati assemblyman Juwairiya Zulkifli motioned for this yesterday during the budget debate session at the Selangor assembly to address the stigma and shame surrounding period poverty issues.

“Among the groups at risk of facing such a situation are women in rural areas, the urban poor, and the extreme poor. For female students, the absence of sanitary pads can limit their movements and activities at school.

“(Period poverty) could interfere with their learning process and might even lead to students choosing not to attend school and contribute to education dropouts.”

According to Juwairiya, period poverty is when individuals lack the access to sanitary pads due to financial constraints, hygiene facilities or suitable waste management.

She added that several foreign countries have also implemented the programme, including South Korea, who offered free sanitary towels since 2018 in all public places, followed by Scotland in 2020.

Meanwhile, New Zealand also introduced free access to sanitary products to 3,200 female students in 15 schools and France has allocated 1 million Euros to provide sanitary pads in schools.

“I hope this programme can continue in the coming years with bigger allocation to deal with period poverty in Selangor,” said Juwairiya.

Late last week, Selangor menteri besar Amirudin Shari announced a RM2.45 billion state budget for next year, which is a 5% increase from this year’s RM 2.34 billion.

Amirudin said 51% of the budget will be used for the state’s administration while the remaining 49% will be used for development.

Amirudin said the state government will have an estimated deficit of RM450 million after taking into account the state’s estimated revenue of RM2 billion.

“The deficit is higher compared to 2022 as we need to spend on preparations to face natural disasters due to climate change,” he said.

“The state also needs to prepare substantial allocations to support Selangor’s rapid development.”

Amirudin said the biggest portion of the state budget for administration would go towards expenditure for services and supply, which takes up to 44.9% of the allocation for administrative works.

He said that salaries of contract cleaners, security guards and maintenance workers in 26 departments would also be raised to RM1,500 in line with the revised minimum wage.

“The development allocation in Budget 2023 will focus on the social sector, unlike previous years which were usually driven by the infrastructure sector.”

The sum would also go towards improving the economy, education and welfare of Selangor residents.