State of Telecom Industry in Pakistan

This week, it will be 2 years since I started TelecomPk.Net. In these 2 years, there have been a number of significant developments both inside and outside Pakistan. I wanted to take a moment and share some thoughts with you. Through blogging I have come across some very interesting people, learned from the broad community of readers, bloggers and the extended network of other experts. Bloggers thrive on feedback and love when traffic is up on their site. Yes, traffic is important but it is far more important to define one’s goals and to deliver value. There are serious challenges confronting us and we need to focus our energies to do more. I often ask myself: what is the value add of this work for the society?

Let me start by sharing a few observations about the ICT and blogging phenomenon in (or about) Pakistan.

• The ICT industry in Pakistan has come a long way. There is plenty of room to grow. Jehan Ara, president of PASHA has has shown great leadership by blogging about her day to day experiences. Her blog offers a fresh approach to brand building and information sharing.
• The rising interest in entrepreneurship, the birth of startup culture and an emerging support structure. As I wrote before, this is a real welcome change. It is heartening to see many young, bright folks working hard to create innovative solutions. A number of expat Pakistanis have returned home - always a good sign.
• Despite some progress and the influx of funds, the education system still lags behind and that’s where the industry needs to step up its efforts. The training and grooming of fresh graduates is a challenge. Huge gaps exist here.
• Pakistani traditional media has been struggling to come to terms with the rise of citizen journalism. Over time the online channel will certainly become a much powerful source of information.
• Today in Pakistan we have the true first electronic generation (those born during the 80s - G80 as I like to call them). Raised on google, sms, chat, orkut and youtube, this digital generation thinks differently from the earlier ones. The generation gap is destabilizing the society in the short-term.

At the same time, the world is going through revolutionary changes, much of it being driven by technology. Look at all the changes during the last 15 years. Information and telecommunication advances have enabled economic growth and resulted in many other tangible benefits. Unfortunately, the positive impact is not distributed equally across all regions. The inequity in Pakistan and many other developing countries is rising sharply. Our pace of growth is alarmingly low. Look at the basic problems of our country (telecom it is not, I assure you) — food, health, education — the situation is pathetic. Some of us have been fortunate enough to move up in the world. But it is frustrating to see that a massive majority of our country’s population does not even get a fair chance at improving their life. How do we enable them to help? It is almost a crime not to harness and tap into the vast potential of our country.

There have been a few initiatives. Last year, a few of us felt the need for a more interactive way of exchanging telecom related ideas and discussions. A brainchild of Tariq Mustafa aka Tee Emm, Telecom Grid Pakistan is almost 500 members strong and has established itself as a combination of consumer advocacy platform, discussion forum and a thinktank for telecom topics in Pakistan.

A few years ago there was not much information about the technology industry in Pakistan. The situation is a bit different now. With the mushrooming of blogs which target telecom news and new phone models, I feel that there is a need to tackle the next set of problems. I believe there’s a lot more that should be done by the Pakistani bloggers (myself included) to raise public awareness, share information and to guide and develop our next generation.

Over the next few weeks I will share ideas for future projects. Please feel free to share your thougts through comments or by email: babar at telecompk dot net.