KARACHI:
Pakistan’s ranking dropped 14 places to 102 in a year out of the 142 countries in the Global Information Technology Report 2012 of the World Economic Forum with most pillars deteriorating.
The ranking shows the government’s lack of efficiency and poor governance, reads a statement released by WEF’s local partner Mishal Pakistan.
The report indicates challenges and opportunities on 10 different pillars, where Pakistan has not been able to show any remarkable improvements in the previous year.
The only positive from the report was that Pakistan stood the fourth cheapest mobile cellular tariffs, showing the cut-throat competition in the telecom sector.
Cellular tariffs came under affordability in the ten pillars which had an impressive rank of 26 among the total 142 countries.
Pakistan lost its competitive advantage on the fixed broadband internet tariffs, where it dropped the ranking to 79 in from 36. The extent of information and communications technologies improving access for all citizens to basic services – health, education, financial services – also took a dip to 113, falling back 30 places from last year.
Pakistan also improved its competitiveness in certain areas including, efficiency of the legal system in challenging regulations, where Pakistan improved from 95 in 2011 to 79 in 2012 out of 142 countries. The judicial independence was also highlighted as one of the advantages in Pakistan.
The quality of education system and the capacity for innovation also shows improvement of 7 points each ranking at 79 and 51, respectively.
Sweden stood (1st) and Singapore (2nd) top the rankings in this year’s report in leveraging information and communications technologies to boost country competitiveness. Switzerland (5th), the Netherlands (6th), the United States (8th), Canada (9th) and the United Kingdom (10th) also show strong performances in the top 10.
“Despite efforts over the past decade to develop information and communications technologies (ICT) infrastructure in developing economies, a new digital divide in terms of ICT impacts persists,” sums up the report.
Published in The Express Tribune, April 5th, 2012.
COMMENTS (22)
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ
@khan: I wouldn't be too negative on the IT industry in Pakistan. It has great potential and it is gaining international recognition. Even here in Canada, people are aware of the growing IT sector in Lahore. In particular I have seen some software applications here which are made and developed in Lahore. Pakistan needs to work on improving Lahore as a software hub and IT centre because the potential exists. It's not a question of image since people here don't care where a product is from as long as it's good and the cost is competitive.
I live in Sweden. ICT here is the best in the world. World has still not fully gripped with 4G cellular technology while Sweden has already marked their way for 5G.Most of the IT companies here has their outsourced international offices in India and China , hardly anything in Pakistan.India is just far far ahead then us. Pakistan expected a boom in early 2000s but sadly business never came in Pak because of poor international image and last few years of PPP Govt has been disastrous.Having said that, I have noticed improvement in Lahore software industry, many individual entrepreneurs has made in roads. In Karachi, apart from TRG and TPS, hardly any prominent IT company.
Well done Pakistan. . Even with current position, you make many so called 'powerful giants' immensely jealous (obvious from comments). . You have come out of every crisis as a stronger nation! Well done!
I think its a conspiracy by RAW , India and what not. How can Pakistan be lower than India when Ilya Lerner who logged in from USA just to prove 90 % of Indians are dumber but Pakistanis are exceptionally well. Even Optimist(who couldn't figure out how to insert a link) showed proof how great Pakistanis in IT are. Pakistan are number 1 India are the last, anybody who don't agree with me is a conspiracy theorist and need to be taught a lesson.
Indians earn a lot more than pakistan thats the bottom line. When will v ever reach 1billion mark?
@Optimist: . From the Two Links I have gleaned the following Information : . India - .......Subscribers : 10,990,000 – Users : 87,983,101 . Pakistan – Subscribers : 00,531,787....Users : 30,943,124 . Are the figures for Pakistan believable??? . Cheers
From Khan to Naresh :p
Also type: List of countries by number of Internet users
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ListofcountriesbynumberofInternet_users
(India 7.50% of poplulatioin/ Pakistan 16.78, Bangladesh: 3.70)
Don't know if ET will give corrected link of mine too..
@Optimist: . Here is the "Corrected" Link : . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ListofcountriesbynumberofbroadbandInternetsubscriptions . List of countries by number of broadband Internet subscriptions . Enjoy! . Cheers
@Ayesha Khan:
Ma'am : Thank you for your statement about India's IT and IT enabled exports - AAP KAY MUNH MEIN GHEE, MADHU AUR MALAI. . As you will see from the following Link The Indian Software and services exports including BPO exports is estimated to be FAR LESS in 2011-12 : . http://www.mit.gov.in/sites/uploadfiles/dit/files/downloads/annualreports/AnnualReport2011-12/AnnualReport2011-12EP1.pdf . ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ANNUAL REPORT – PART I . EXPORTS : The Indian Software and services exports including BPO exports is estimated at US$ 68.7 Billion in 2011-12, as compared to US$ 59 Billion in 2010-11, an increase of 16.4 per cent. The IT service exports is estimated at US$ 39.8 Billion as compared to US$ 33.5 Billion in 2010-11, showing a growth of 18.8 per cent. BPO exports is estimated to grow from US$ 14.2 Billion in 2010-11 to US$ 15.9 Billion in 2011-12, a year-on-year (Y-o-Y) growth of about 12 per cent. IT services contributed to 59 per cent of total IT-BPO exports in 2011-12, followed by BPO at 23 per cent and Software products/engineering services at 19 per cent. . As such Indian Software and services exports including BPO exports are not even 275 Times of your quoted Figure of Pakistan’s IT and IT enable d exports being around $250 million. . Best of Luck to Pakistan's IT Industry.
Cheers
@Illya, I can confirm also that I recruited 5 pakistani IT consultants last year as contractors in UK among a big team of 200 Indian IT specialists and out of 5 only 1 is good enough to be given extensions for this financial year 2012-13! .. Does it say anything about IT skills in Pakistan or India ? .Actually Nothing..
@ Khan
Your link doesn't exist either (now you know its not the link, its the website!). Type world ranking in Intenet connectivity. . Your second comment exposed you as a jealous neighbour. I already knew what you'd say. . India is far ahead in many IT related things. We started quite late. But your comments show either India is Not that big (exaggerated) OR you guys have too small heart to appreciate!
I have worked with top Indian consultancy firm, out of a team of 20, 18 are dumb, but they have good marketing strategy globally, and their service portfolio is much greater than their competitors. The number of qualified resources are less in pakistan but they are exceptionally well.
Ilya Lerner NY, USA
Despite the problems which are highlighted, the IT usage is growing in Pakistan. Its progress may be slow, at times may not be highlighted in the manner in media, it certainly is growing. I am not very tech-savvy but recently I was very surprised to find out that all police stations in Lahore are linked via computers and they have a big data center available to Lahore police. All the FIRs etc are now being electronically recorded and are saved in the data center. Kudos to the people in the police and the civil sector who have made it all possible. I hope the Government takes notice and make it happen in other cities of Pakistan. This shows that there are some who are honestly working and make it happen. Similarly, there are many other examples where success has been made in this sector and the gains are impressive. We must appreciate these happenings and yes - think positive.
Well Pakistan is improving but i see too much criticism from the Pakistanis about there own country. Learn to be positive,
Why cant Pakistan be a leader ? They have the potential
@Javed: "Pakistani IT industry is as good as India. India has better PR."
This is not about how good or bad the IT industry is but what type of ICT access ordinary citizens of a country have. Separately, Pakistan's IT and IT enable d exports are around $250 million. Corresponding number for India is over 1 $100 billion. In other words India's exports are around 4000 times that of Pakistan.
@Javed Having youngest Microsoft Certified professional does nothing to the country's IT industry. Pakistanis must learn to stop thinking that Pakistan is a land of miracles and people are born here with amazing super-human like powers ...youngest this, youngest that and oblivious people praising them like Pakistan is blessed by some miraculous powers, I am just fed-up of this. Mr Javed, better work on our weaknesses, stop the conspiracy theories and STOP comparing with India, comparing with India does not give us a certificate of greatness (they are doing much better anyway). And please end these conspiracy theories, this survey includes 142 countries!!
We developed too fast in IT during last decade. Even with this dip, there is a hope that we can perform better in near future, as we had major disasters in 2010 & 2011. Floods in 2010 were termed biggest disaster in UN's history. Still our economy grew a little. . We are still leaders in South Asia where 16% of our people have access to the Net (more than double from India and approximately 6 times more than Bangladesh)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ListofcountriesbynumberofInternet_users . Lets not let some jealous person belittle our achievements (despite big problems/terrorism etc). . Remember negativity begets negativity.
No big deal. This is only a correction. The initial rankings were wrong. PAK is now where it should be.
ha ha... thanks for showing the real picture. The day I saw some IT news here and there, I knew either these are fraud reports or we are making an elephant out of an ant. We know very well that IT in this country is negligible, and then there are "experts" who go gung ho to prove that we have made great achievement it seems. We are is the bottom of world, and as usual, try false propaganda to punch above our weight, as in all other field.