Deregulation paying dividends: Awais

Minister for Information Technology Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari on Monday said telecom sector in Pakistan had gone through a tremendous growth over last four years with a massive investment coming in that area in the wake of deregulation.
He said this prior to his departure to South Korea where he was leading a 41-member delegation to attend ITU Telecom Asia being held in Busan from September 7-11.
Pakistan's delegation includes officials from the Ministry of Information Technology, Pakistan Software Export Board (PSEB), National Telecommunication Corporation (NTC) Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL), Special Communication Organisation (SCO) and representatives from leading private-sector telecom companies which would display their products at the exhibition.
"Indeed, information communication technologies have a strategic role in promoting economic development," he said and added the government was dedicated to the instrumental task of successfully implementing the deregulation process for the growth of telecom sector.
Awais maintained ITU Telecom Asia-2004 marked a historic development for the people of Pakistan as Pakistan's participation in this big event runs along aside the completion of the process of opening up and deregulating the telecom sector.
"Pakistan is also on the path to successfully incorporating key objectives of the World Summit on Information Society's Declaration of Principles adopted by the C across the information and communication technology (ICT) sector within the Asia-Pacific region which was fast emerging as the largest communications market and an epicentre for the global growth, the minister said.
"Pakistan's participation for the first time ever will be a milestone marking the considerable distance that we had covered since our emergence on the information and communication technology world map," he said.
It may be added that ITU Telecom Asia features high quality speakers and participants, and promises a series of industry-critical debates.
The exhibition features the latest products and services -from across the spectrum of the telecom industry, and top names such as ZTE Huawei, Samsung, China Mobile, Lucent, NTT Do Co Mo etc.