E-governance to improve performance in Pakistan: Leghari
Pakistan Times Business & Commerce Desk

KARACHI: Federal Minister for IT and Telecom Awais Ahmed Khan Leghari has said the government will outsource its IT and e-governance requirements worth $50 to 100 million to private sector in next 18 months.

He was addressing a seminar on "Enhancing productivity for the textile sector through use of IT", organised by IT solution providers Arwen Technology Ltd (ATL) here on Saturday.

He said the government was working on a major plan to adopt e-governance in its departments to improve their working and would outsource huge amount of IT work to private sector in near future to attract more IT solution provider companies in the country.

He said leading international IT solution providers like Microsoft and IBM could team up for these projects and must register with the government.

"There is a certain criteria and local companies can go for collaboration with foreign companies if they feel short of resources and expertise," he added.

He further said the government was also expecting other leading world players to participate in this task.

He informed that the first meeting of National E-government Council (NEGC) would be held under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on April 23 at Islamabad to give approval to a five-year plan of e-governance.

He said that all the government departments would be given targets to implement e-governance.

"The government will also urge private sector, especially the textile sector, to take up IT solutions to enhance their productivity, improve efficiency, cut cost by plugging leakages and satisfy their buyers," Leghari maintained.

He said that the government is working to create a much better tax-incentive environment to gear up the growth of IT sector and attract leading companies in Pakistan.

"We have recommended a tax cut of 5 per cent for IT solution providers in the forthcoming budget," he added.

The minister was optimistic that the IT sector will grow much more rapidly in next two years.

Commenting on the training of manpower in IT sector, the minister said that the government would use its research and development fund worth Rs2 billion for human resource training in textile sector.

Appreciating the entry of Arwen Technology Ltd (ATL) in textile sector, the minister said that the company was doing a job for the government, adding, "textile sector must use this technology to upgrade its product quality, standards and processes to world level."

Earlier, Chief Executive Officer ATL Atiq Rehman said that his company provided total solution to the textile industry for increasing productivity, efficiency, cost reduction while the return is much higher.●