MoIT and PSEB Organizes Workshop on Improving Lives of Marginalised Segment of Society

Pakistan Software Export Board (PSEB) and Ministry of Information Technology (MoIT) organized a workshop on effective use of ICTs for fundamental developments to help the marginalized segments of societies of Pakistan. The workshop was arranged here on Monday and was held under the ICT4D UNESCO, chaired by Professor Tim Unwin. There were four sessions organized on following main areas:

• Local content development
• Collaboration with international research partners
• Competition policy
• Emerging business models

MoIT and PSEB Organizes Workshop on Improving Lives of Marginalised Segment of Society

The opening session of seminar included speeches from ICT4D UNESCO Chairperson Professor Tim Unwin, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) Chairman Dr Ismail Shah and IT Secretary Azmat Ali Ranjha.

In this regard, PSEB showed a documentary to the Ministry while highlighting the achievements of IT of Pakistan. The Ministry appreciated it.

The IT secretary Azmat Ali Ranjh shed light on some of the fundamental achievements of IT Ministry over the past few years which mainly includes exponential growth in broadband users, launch of nine USF projects in backward areas at a cost of Rs 20 billion, 40% growth in IT remittances, and also the implementation of E-office suite at the IT Ministry. He said that:

“Rural people cannot afford to pay for applications and content. Government can play a role in sponsorship and development of such applications for free distribution to rural segments of the society.”

The last session of seminar Prof Unwin discussed the OTT (over-the-top) applications such as WhatsApp, Skype, Facebook, and other applications. He said that:

“Although OTT is often seen as hurting revenues of telcos, innovative telcos that can develop new business models for continued growth and come up with new ways of generating revenue by bundling OTT with other services.”