Dream of a Digital Pakistan | Badar Khushnood | TEDxCrescent Model School Youth

Pakistan's Tech Landscape - Pakistan's digital dream hinges on understanding and improving current systems for Gen Z and Gen Alpha [3] - The country has approximately 30,000 registered tech companies, with 6,000 involved in exports [10] - IT-enabled services and IT services exports are the second largest for Pakistan, contributing about $38 billion annually [10][35] - Roughly half a million freelancers contribute around $500 million to Pakistan's economy each year [10] - Domestic e-commerce has grown to $5 billion annually [13][14] - Pakistani startups have raised $1 billion through venture capital from 2019 to 2022 [14] Challenges and Opportunities - Less than 10% of the 50,000 computer science and engineering graduates in Pakistan are employable, highlighting a quality of education gap [15] - Pakistan has a low entrepreneurship ratio with only 7 million SMEs compared to Nigeria's 40 million [16] - There's a low taxpayer to population ratio, with only 7 million active taxpayers and a significant portion filing zero returns [17][18] - Pakistan's exports are significantly lower than Singapore's despite a much larger population, indicating low productivity per capita [19][20] Recommendations for Improvement - The industry needs to shift from focusing solely on IT services exports to domestic innovation and digital transformation of local businesses [36][37] - Focus on improving teachers' ability to teach and curate content, connecting student welfare to teacher performance [21][22][23] - The industry needs to fix Pakistan's policies when it comes to education and technology [25] - The industry needs to focus inwards, improve fundamentals, and prioritize "Made in Pakistan" before looking outwards [40]