Is Pakistan taking away IT Jobs from India?

The IT industry in Pakistan is blamed for taking over low-end IT jobs from India. According to reports, a US-based IT client has shifted 125 remote jobs from India’s Noida to Islamabad. The gradual shift is affecting the Indian IT industry.

India’s leading magazine, Outlook India recently published a report about the US-based company shifting its outsourced services from Noida to Islamabad. Ahsan Iqbal, the Planning and Development Minister of Pakistan tweeted the story stating that this was an International recognition of Pakistan’s IT policies.

The IT sector in Pakistan is growing at fast pace, it is currently valued $3 billion. The country has observed 100% growth in just last four years. It is expected to be double and touch the valuation of $6 billion in next few two to four years. While the growth rate is quite high, it is supposed to narrow the gap somewhere. 

Indian IT sector’s growth rate is only 7-8% but, the size of the IT industry in India is 51x bigger than Pakistan. The Indian IT industry is worth $154 billion, out of which $117 billion contributes to International business and $38 billion of business is domestic. Quite surprisingly, India’s IT industry is losing international clients to contributes like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Malaysia, and the Philippines.

The jobs that have been shifted from India to Pakistan are low-end IT jobs. Indian IT industry is catering to core software development than the low-end outsourcing jobs. However, the share of data operators and business process outsourcing (BPO) units contribute a big part to India’s IT industry.

India’s IT industry has moved to a new wave of jobs that lies in areas like robotics, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, biotechnology, quantum computing, Internet of Things (IoT), 3D printing and autonomous vehicles. The pursuit of these new jobs is the reason why the country is losing low-end or cheaper jobs.

The developing IT industries in countries like Pakistan can capitalize on this opportunity and grab some International business. According to the data, over 10,000 IT graduates enter the IT job market in Pakistan every year. The current size of Pakistan’s IT industry consists of 150,000 full-time professionals and close to 2 lakh freelancers. The freelancers in Pakistan have better credibility and rating as compared to the other countries.

Shehryar Hydri, the secretary general of Pakistan Software House Association (PASHA) said, “The future belongs to the tech sector and the government needs to support IT like it has done with textile. Like the overall economy, Pakistan’s IT industry is also showing positive signs, but political instability can undermine its growth since investors don’t feel safe investing in countries where political turmoil prevails.”

The individual efforts of the companies are attracting some foreign investments in the IT sector. Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce giant has decided to agree $400 million in Pakistan. China Telecom Global (CTG) has partnered with the government to upgrade the optical fiber network across the country.

– Rajat Kabade

Source link

The post Is Pakistan taking away IT Jobs from India? appeared first on Tech And Tricks.