The Pakistani IT industry could grow faster by checking software piracy, as 83 percent illegal software installed on computers last year represented a loss of over $ 16 million to the information technology (IT) sector.
This was stated in the latest global software piracy study released by the Business Software Alliance (BSA), a group of the world's leading software manufacturers.
"These figures show that software piracy continues to be a major problem in Pakistan", said Middle East BSA Co-Chairman Al Redha, while commenting on the results of the report.
The 83 percent software piracy rate places Pakistan at No. 4 among the Asia Pacific region countries, followed by China, Vietnam and Indonesia, he added.
"If the piracy rate is not reduced significantly, it would continue to harm the development of Pak IT industry and the economy as a whole", he observed.
The study noted that software piracy has many negative economic consequences, which include crippling of local software industry from competition with high-quality pirated software from abroad, and lost tax revenues and jobs from lack of a legitimate market. These costs reverberate up and down the supply and distribution chains, it added.
The report also pointed out that the revenues that are lost to piracy are vital to the survival of smaller, local software developers, and that ultimately undermines the country's ability to develop new products and compete in the global market. "Hence, there is much to be done to respect copyrighted works in Pakistan", said Al Redha.
The BSA co-chairman was optimistic that with the law enforcement activities and awareness programmes, the software piracy rate in Pakistan would fall, and urged all the organisations to use legal software.
He said: "The BSA will continue to work with governments across the region to encourage them to enact policies for protecting intellectual property and implementing programmes to educate consumers about the importance of copyright protection for creative works."
BSA members include many of world's leading computer companies such as Adobe, Apple, Autodesk, Bentley Systems, Macromedia, McAfee, Microsoft, 7 Sybase and Symantec.
The study was conducted by the International Data Corporation (IDC), an IT industry's leading global market research and forecasting firm.
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