Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz has said teleconnectivity and teledensity in the country has increased manifold due to well thought out and well executed reforms by the present government. He was speaking at a function organised to observe the World Telecommunication and Information Society Day here on Thursday.
Shaukat said the government is proud that teledensity has increased from four percent to forty percent over the past four years and 62 million people have telephone connections today.
He said this unleashing of connectivity has tremendous benefits for the country. About nine billion dollars of investment has come in the telecom sector over the past four years from local and foreign investors.
He said having a population of one hundred and sixty million, about one hundred million are below the age of 25 years and the theme of the day "connecting the young" fits in for progressive, prosperous and peaceful Pakistan. He said Pakistan's success in the telecom areas is the direct result of reform dividends, which were extensive, deep, broad and substantive.
The PM said today, the people of Pakistan specially, the youth are not waiting for years to get telephone connections. They can get a mobile phone immediately.
He said because of the privatisation of the telecom sector, the tariffs have gone down and more than seven lakh jobs have been created because of the telecom boom.
Shaukat said Pakistan is moving ahead over the last several years because of consistency, continuity and clearity of policies and decisions made in the national interest. The Minister for Information Technology, Owais Ahmed Khan Leghari in his key note address said the country has seen a huge growth in the telecom sector.
He said we expect more than one hundred million individuals to get telephonically connected in the next four to five years, which speaks of the huge market that Pakistan offers to investors in this field.