The impression that the policy document gives is that the policy is trying to do too many things. My understanding is that a policy should not try to put in specific goals rather it should provide the broader outlines which should then be executed through different projects in the form of an action plan.
The most important hindrance in terms of creating an enabling environment for private enterprises is not the ease of entry, rather it is the painful process of going through with an exit strategy. The process is so tedious and cumbersome that a lot of companies simply refuse to do business in Pakistan because of this. So the policy must make the exit process easier as has been the case in the Startup India Policy introduced by India.
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I get the impression that the policy is not user-centric enough. It focuses too much on the IT industry alone. It doesn’t look at the bulk of the economy that is not using IT and is working on manual processes e.g. the bulk of financial transaction in Karachi takes place through informal methods. These are the focus areas that the policy must address rather than incentivizing the already incentivized industry.
Another critical feature is the need to develop quality human resource. The biggest hurdle to the expansion of our IT industry is that we don’t have sufficient human resource that can meet the needs of international and even local companies.
In my opinion, this can’t be fixed at the university level as the foundations for students have already been made permanent by then. We need to invest in schools, especially government ones. I think the best way to go about it is to turn these schools around and ensure quality, perhaps through PPP models so that our labor force is more productive.
Good effort...still going through the drafts, will give feedback after detailed analysis
I would like to present the following suggestions:
- The duration of tax breaks should be at least 10 years
- Government should provide greater number of scholarships as tool for capacity building.
The initiative for Digital Literacy is a positive step. However, the government must strive to decentralize it and let the private sector take lead in this. For this purpose, the government can introduce interest free or low interest loans so that the private sector can be incentivized to set up Digital Literacy Centers.
Instead of simply stating 2017 as the year of IT, government should celebrate the role of IT in different segments of the society on a year-to-year basis. For example, 2017 could be named “Digital for Education”, 2018 as “Digital for Empowerment” and so on. This would allow for the momentum to last the distance rather than celebrating IT for a year and forgetting it thereafter.
- Under E’s of the Punjab IT Policy: E-Presence, if not covered under Empowerment, may please be considered to make it part of E’s of Punjab IT Policy. Incase it is already covered under umbrella of Empowerment then there is need to give move focus to E-Presence. This may include taking people and other stakeholders on board through E-Portals and other electronic Social mediums.
- Establishment of campuses of PITB & ITU at Rawalpindi, Faisalabad & Multan. Also covering these areas via video-links for all seminars etc.
- Connecting DCs, ACs offices through video links
- Be First in the World to declare internet as a part of basic human rights.
- Data Science, another emerging area in the field of IT may please be given place in proposed IT Policy of the Punjab province\
- Establishment of Central Research Centre to carry R&D to upgrade life standards of a common man: Although Research Centres are proposed in each domain. However, central Research Centre based on collecting data electronically especially from masses can be very helpful. In this regarding Collection and Analysis on internet traffic (like Google search & URLs etc) can be very fruitful. Data can be collected from ISPs & Mobile Operators, which are providing internet services in each area of Punjab. This may include but not limited to deficiency and emerging areas in Education, Economy, Health and other domains being covered or not covered under Punjab IT Policy.
Govt. sector is under control of CLERKS. In govt sector is govt making any policy regarding service structure of IT professionals in govt sector?
There are mentioned 10 goals of IT policy in Executive summary . One important goal must availability/sharing of DATA (collected by govt. sector) to masses for research purposes.
Good work initiated from PITB and credit goes to Dr. UMar Saif. I belong to Azad Kashmir and I have done master in Computer science from COMSATS back in 2004. I want to give some input regarding the IT setup in AJK and gilgit baltastan and keeping in view the lack of IT skilled manpower in these states should be covered in this policy. With the liason of AJK govt and some technical reps kindly try to incorporate their needs in this policy so that they can execute/implement IT projects without further delaying in this era of IT.
Government of Punjab must provide more emphasis on working with other provinces in the realm of Information technology so that the country can prosper as a whole. More exhaustive consideration needs to be given to this particular aspect in the Policy.
The most important sector, in my opinion, is the e-commerce industry. I believe that this must be given more emphasis in the policy and we must come up with accurate and realistic numbers that can help determine the true potential of this sector. There is also a need for Fintech enablement, where the government must work with the fintech industry to make digital payments more convenient and secure.
The regulatory structure of the tax regime is also something that must be paid heed to. Our current structure deters companies from bringing foreign exchange in Pakistan and most of the companies have set up parent or sister companies in the US so that they only bring the bare minimum amount to Pakistan which helps meet salary and administrative expenses. This needs to change and the provincial and federal governments must work together to achieve this goal rather than all of them working in their own bubbles.
The government should look to specifically incentivize the BPO sector, as I believe that it is missing from the policy document.
Moreover, government should consider launching radio, tv and youtube channels to provide masses with the opportunities for online learning.
The government should also consider tax breaks for companies based on the employment generated as this would help increase local deployment of resources.