ISLAMABAD: President Dr Arif Alvi has called for promoting knowledge-based economy and digitalisation of government organisations to enhance the efficiency of work and service delivery.
The president said this on Monday while talking to a delegation of Huawei, which was headed by Huawei Middle East Region Vice President Li Xiangyu.
The president said that Pakistan is blessed with immense talent and resources and the government is making serious efforts to channelise this potential in the right direction.
Li Xiangyu in his presentation informed that Huawei has contributed to Pakistan’s economy by providing 10,000 jobs and paying $120 million in taxes, besides spending $6 million to support disaster-relief efforts of the government.
He said Huawei has contributed to Pakistan’s information and communication technology talent by providing 10,000 certifications in 2020. He said Huawei would train over 1000 government employees to achieve the Digital Pakistan Initiative.
He apprised the meeting that government officials would be registered and enrolled for training programmes, which would be conducted through Huawei experts.
President Alvi appreciated the initiative of Huawei to provide training and ICT skills to the people of Pakistan. He asked the ministry of information technology and telecommunication to develop an action plan and set time lines for launching training programmes for the government employees to train them in fields like artificial intelligence, cloud technology, big data, blockchain, neural networks and communication technologies.
He urged the ministry to come up with more innovative ideas and enhance collaboration with Huawei for early realisation of Digital Pakistan Initiative.
The meeting was also attended by Ministry of Science and Technology Secretary Dr Arshad Mahmood, Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training Secretary Farah Hamid, Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication Additional Secretary Ali Sher Mehsud, and other senior officials, while Prime Minister Task Force on Science and Technology Chairman Dr Atta-ur-Rehman attended the meeting via video link.
NEED FOR ESTABLISHING TELEMEDICINE CLINICS:
Separately, in a meeting on telehealth at Aiwan-e-Sadr, President Dr Arif Alvi emphasised the need for establishing primary healthcare telemedicine clinics to provide free advice to the people and improve the quality of care in the country.
He stated that there is a need to invest in telemedicine through enhanced infrastructure, technology and human resources to provide equitable health facilities to the population living in remote areas of Pakistan.
The president underscored the need to strengthen the capacity of the health sector at the national level with the help of medical professionals in the fields of public health and artificial intelligence to analyse various datasets and predict outbreaks of epidemics.
He stated that the government of Pakistan is committed to transform the health care delivery sector of the entire country and initiate measures to provide free-of-cost medical advice to the people under the telehealth programme.
He emphasised the need for amalgamating all platforms working for telehealth in the country so as to provide medical relief to people in a more efficient and effective manner.
The ministry of national health services regulations and coordination gave a presentation about the importance of telehealth in Pakistan. The ministry informed that it provided free online consultation across Pakistan under Sehat Express Portal, which provided medical advice to people during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The meeting on telehealth was attended by Special Assistant to Prime Minister on National Health Services, Regulations and Coordination Dr Faisal Sultan, Health Director General Dr Rana Muhammad Safdar and other senior officials.
