Federal Minister for Information Technology and Telecommunication Shaza Fatima Khawaja has said Pakistan believes the 21st century belongs to emerging nations that can use digital technology to create wealth and shape their own future.
\nAddressing the LEAP 2026 conference on \u201cHow We Built a Digital Nation\u201d, she said Pakistan was building its national digital stack on open-source technology.
\nShe said Pakistan would share the digital stack free of cost with frontier and emerging nations once it was completed. Digital technology should help countries move beyond modernisation towards wealth creation and greater economic independence, she added.
\nMs Shaza said Pakistan had moved away from pursuing \u201cfancy big projects\u201d and was focusing instead on building strong digital foundations.
\nOver the past two years, she said, the government had introduced key legislation, including the Digital Nation Pakistan Act and the National AI Policy.
\nThe measures aimed to support the technology ecosystem while ensuring ethical, security and sovereignty safeguards, she added.
\nShe said right-of-way reforms had also been introduced to promote fibre connectivity and broadband adoption.
\n\u201cIn a nutshell, what we did was the grunt work for very strong, solid foundations for a digital era,\u201d she said.
\nThe minister said the government began its efforts by listening to the concerns of investors, industry, young people and international partners.
\nShe identified digital connectivity as the first major challenge, saying digital development was impossible without reliable, high-speed internet across the country.
\nSpectrum availability had been a major bottleneck, she said, adding that Pakistan had conducted the world\u2019s largest spectrum auction, offering 480 megahertz.
\nThe rollout was now well underway, she said. Pakistan had also landed two new submarine cables, while fibre reforms had been introduced and house passes had increased by almost 100 per cent.
\nShaza identified policy continuity as the second major challenge. She credited Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif with establishing the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC), which she said had helped ensure policy continuity.
\nThe council is headed by the prime minister and supported by Chief of Defence Forces Field Marshal Syed Asim Munir. It also includes the chief executives of the four provinces and cabinet members.
\nBusiness competitiveness was the third major challenge, particularly for technology companies facing taxation-related difficulties, she said.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve developed special technology zones for our companies that have tax-free status for the next 10 years,\u201d she said.
\nPakistan was also working to introduce international payment gateways for its youth and expand sovereign computing, she added.
\n\u201cThese are two areas where we feel that any investor who comes in \u2026 has a huge opportunity to capture in a country like Pakistan,\u201d she said.
\nThe minister said digital transformation had become a priority across the government.
\n\u201cAll our ministries now understand that tech is no longer a vertical, but an enabling sector that has to be woven into every single strategy,\u201d she said.
\nExplaining the need for rapid digital transformation, Shaza said economies generally grew through an S-curve, moving from gradual development to rapid expansion before reaching a plateau.
\nCountries at that stage, she said, needed innovation, partnerships and smart investment to sustain growth. \u201cIf you want to compress decades into years and cross this S-curve fast to become a developed nation with a diversified economy, you must become a digital nation,\u201d she said.
\nShe described digital transformation as the \u201csingle greatest intervention\u201d a government could make to secure its future and accelerate development.
\nShaza said Pakistan had laid the foundations of a digital nation and was now rapidly building its digital stack. She described Pakistan as one of the world\u2019s largest investment opportunities and said stable leadership, digital public infrastructure and ecosystem investment could make double-digit digital growth possible.
\nPakistan, she added, had a population of 240 million, with more than 150 million people under 30.
\n\u201cWe cannot afford to learn slowly,\u201d she said.
\nSharing lessons from Pakistan\u2019s digital transformation, the minister said governments should learn from countries that had already undergone the process. She outlined five lessons from Pakistan\u2019s experience. The first, she said, was that governments should make laws and policies, not software. The government\u2019s role was to create supportive laws, policies and institutions with clear mandates.
\nThe second lesson was the need for a digital GovTech agency between the ministry responsible for policy and the public and private entities implementing projects.
\nSuch an agency should develop a target operating model and enable a whole-of-government approach, she said.
\nIdeally, the agency should report directly to the head of state. In Pakistan, she said, the National Digital Commission reported to the prime minister.
\nPakistan\u2019s target operating model is the Digital Nation Master Plan, which focuses on interoperability based on trust and security.
\nThe third lesson was the importance of maintaining focus. Shaza stressed the need for discipline, measurable targets, key performance indicators and regular follow-up to ensure implementation.
\nThe fourth lesson was to \u201cbuild rails, not products\u201d. The state should develop data exchange, digital identity, payments and other basic infrastructure before allowing the private sector to build products on top of it, she said.
\n\u201cOur job is to hand them the backend, the tools, the embedded finance, the parameters of acceptable building, and then watch them do the magic,\u201d she said.
\nShe cited WeChat as an example, saying 97pc of its applications were owned by the private sector.
\nThe fifth lesson, she said, was that governments and nations could not work in silos. \u201cNo nation can go at it alone, and nations that join together go further,\u201d she said.
\nShe said the five lessons had helped Pakistan establish the foundations and strategic direction for its digital transformation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Federal Minister for Information Technology and Telecommunication Shaza Fatima Khawaja has said Pakistan believes the 21st century belongs to emerging nations that can use digital technology to create wealth and shape their own future. Addressing the LEAP 2026 conference on \u201cHow We Built a Digital Nation\u201d, she said Pakistan was building its national digital stack […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":475421,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-565947","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-top-news"],"yoast_head":"\n