ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Information Technology and Telecommunication Syed Amin ul Haue on Saturday said the government of Pakistan was committed to reduce digital divide between rural and urban communities and focuses on youth empowerment as well as gender equality. Due to the effective policies of the incumbent government, Pakistan witnessed landmark achievements in the ICT sector in recent years, he expressed these views while addressing to the Digital Cooperation Organisation (DCO) virtual meeting. The Digital Cooperation Organisation held a forum along-side the UN General Assembly, inviting the Ministers from all the seven member countries. The aim of the event was to discuss role of the cooperation in building an inclusive digital age within which more nations could prosper. Ministers from all seven Founder Member Countries Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Nigeria Oman and Saudi Arabia Including Pakistan attended the meeting while Maria-Francesca Spatolisano, Assistant Secretary General for Policy Coordination and Inter-Agency Affairs, of UN also joined the session. Amin said the government of Pakistan brought many reforms for creating a better environment for tech-based businesses in the country. Minister IT said rise of digital economy, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, had transformed the world, but its global potential was yet to be fully realise. Countries faced new challenges as the global scale of the digital economy and the power of private sector actors grows, he added. The minister said, “Digital Cooperation Organisation (DCO) has emerged as one of the most promising collaborative forums to promote digital partnerships among like-minded countries” . “Being a founding member of DCO, the government of Pakistan fully endorses that DCO is actively pursuing its vision of achieving social prosperity and growth of the digital economy by unifying efforts to advance the digital transformation agenda and promote common interests of the member states” he added. Syed Amin ul Haque highlighted the efforts of Pakistan towards Digitisation and said under the visionary leadership of Prime Minister Imran Khan, Pakistan has re-energised its digital transformation journey with the launch of Digital Pakistan that aimed to enhance connectivity, improve digital infrastructure, increase investment in digital skills, promote innovation, and technology entrepreneurship. Government of Pakistan strongly believed in mass adoption of emerging digital technologies and innovative applications to enable cross-sector socio-economic development and transformation of economic activities, governance models, social interaction, and achievement of sustainable development goals, Amin ul Haque stated. He mentioned that Pakistan had been named one of the fastest growing economies in Asia in Mckinsey and Co’s latest report on the Pakistani ecosystem. During the fiscal year 2020-21, Pakistan’s IT exports increased 47.4 percent and crossed the US $ two billion mark for the first time in the country’s history, he added. The World Economic Forum (WEF), he said, ranked Pakistan among the best countries in terms of the affordability of ICT services, while according to latest International Labour Organization report, Pakistan had been as the second largest supplier of online labour in software development and technology. He said, that Pakistan substantially improved its position in the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business report. The IT Minister said the government had a vision of accelerated digitisation and transformation of Pakistan into a knowledge based economy to spur economic growth through innovation and entrepreneurship. Ministry of IT and Telecom, launched a program to build a network of National Incubation Centers. It had successfully established five National Incubation Centers (NIC) in Federal Capital and all Provincial Capitals of the Country, inducting 440+ promising Startups. “A strategic plan and road-map for 5G technology in Pakistan is also being formulated keeping in view the aspects of Spectrum Management, Infrastructure Development, Review of Telecom Regulations and 5G applications/use cases”, he added. Syd Amin ul Haque said the DCO provided an ideal platform for Pakistan and other countries to learn from each other by working together and collaborate at the regional level, which had significant impact across the globe. He thanked to UN and DCO for organising this session and invite UN member countries to join hands with DCO to achieve shared goal of digital transformation and promoting joint initiatives to leverage ICT potential for the socio-economic growth.