Daily Times

FPCCI acting president Shabbir Mansha has expressed his longstanding concern that despite having a young, energetic, and driven population of 65pc, Pakistan has not yet even partially capitalized on its potential in the various tech industries in general and in information technology and information technology-enabled services (ITeS) in particular. On the other hand, he insisted that Pakistan is on track to break through the psychological barrier of $3b in IT exports during the preceding fiscal year 2021–22.

Shabbir Mansha stated that from the feedback of the business, industry, and trade community of Pakistan, we can say that Pakistan has a shortage of up to 500,000 IT professionals; as our IT exports and domestic digital transformation efforts have kicked in on a large-scale. Nonetheless, the IT & computer science graduates from Pakistani universities are not readily employable for their lack of practical training in the universities and they invariably need internationally-accepted professional certifications before they can be meaningfully employed. Acting FPCCI Chief has also welcomed Special Technology Zones Authority (STZA) initiatives in facilitating the establishment of tech companies and pinned his hopes that STZA will soon announce the establishment of a technology zone for Karachi soon.

STZA chairman Amer Hashmi apprised the business community that the institution is working on a Triple Helix Model of Industry-Government-Academia to take a holistic and time-proven approach from the success stories of technology parks from the world over.

Mr. Javaid Iqbal, Chief Commercial Officer of STZA, briefed that the required legal cover in the form of an act of parliament has been provided to STZA and it has already launched technology zones in Lahore, Islamabad, and Haripur (KPK). Subsequently, STZA will launch technology zones in Sindh, Balochistan, Azad Jammu & Kashmir, and Gilgit Baltistan.

Indus University president Khalid Amin said STZA & PSEB must establish close liaison with the universities to enable them to design and offer IT & computer science programs in accordance with the current demands of the IT & ITeS companies in Pakistan and abroad.

Mr. Shabbir Mansha added that Pakistan should aim for $10 – 15 worth of IT & ITeS exports over the period of the next 4 -5 years and this is very much doable. He mentioned that even the most advanced IT industries of the world like the US and Europe still have HR shortages for the technologies of the future.