Pakistan crosses $1b in digital subsidies

An Asia-Pacific Telecommunity symposium opened in Islamabad on Tuesday, bringing ministers, regulators and industry executives together for three days of discussion on digital transformation and the Universal Service Fund. According to The Express Tribune, member states are set to draft a framework that takes universal service beyond basic coverage and voice support, moving toward gigabit fibre, satellite networks, smartphone financing and rural AI infrastructure.

Federal IT Minister Shaza Fatima Khawaja, the chief guest, told delegates that roughly 2.2 billion individuals across the globe, and close to 48% of people in the Asia-Pacific region, remain offline, a proportion that exceeds the worldwide mean. She framed connectivity as essential for schooling, medical care, disaster response and security, and said the National Connectivity Plan is checked every fortnight under Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.

Pakistan has surpassed $1.054 billion in digital subsidies, and fibre cable now stretches beyond 17,000 kilometres. Fibre broadband reaches over five million homes, up from fewer than three million earlier, while the share of mobile towers converted to fibre rose from 15% to above 19%, compared with a minimum 60% goal for 5G delivery. Chaudhry Mudassar Naveed, chief executive of USF Pakistan, said 158 of 185 projects are complete, drawing on more than Rs169 billion and reaching over 38.4 million people.