Prime Minister Imran Khan Thursday said Pakistan is pursuing multiple initiatives and programmes to harness potential of youth and provide them with education, skills and training.
While virtually addressing the 10th D8 summit held in Dhaka, he said harnessing technology, promoting innovation and investing in youth education, skills and training is an urgent imperative.
This year’s theme of the conference was “Partnership for a Transformative World: Harnessing the Power of Youth and Technology.”
He told the conference that Pakistan is pursuing initiatives and programmes such as Kamyab Naujawan, Hunarmand Pakistan, youth entrepreneurship scheme and digital Pakistan. The prime minister said because of the inter-connectedness of the countries and economic, social and environmental vulnerabilities created by this interconnectedness, the coronavirus pandemic has caused death of over 2.9 million people and more than 250 million people had become unemployed and trillions of dollars were lost as a result of the global economic contraction.
The prime minister said the coronavirus has taken a heavy toll on poor countries and also inequality has been accentuated within the countries and between the rich and poor countries. The developing countries are not only faced with the dilemma of saving their citizens from the deadly virus but they also have to save people from hunger, he observed.
He said today the world boasts the largest number of young people in history. Even before the pandemic struck, one fifth of youth in the world were unemployed and did not have the education and skills to equip themselves for the 21st century, he remarked. “We have 550 million youth population in the D8 countries. Our youth not only has the potential to optimize opportunities but they can also help overcome the present challenges.”
He said the developing countries had youth entrepreneurs, business innovators, technology pioneers, educators, artists and journalists and “we must create opportunities for this predominant component of the population”.
Imran Khan said the pace of change in the world has intensified and the rate of change has become exponential. Innovation and breakthroughs in technology, he said, are transforming the science fiction of yesterday into reality of today. Only five years ago, the World Economic Forum had predicted that the Fourth Industrial Revolution “will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another.”
Imran said as the automation substituted for labour across the world, the labour intensive economies of D8 faced challenges of unemployment and social disruption. He said the D8 countries should ask that the coronavirus vaccine should be treated as a global public good to ensure equity, affordability, enhanced production and timely supply to save lives. “We must push back against vaccine nationalism and undue export restrictions. The global vaccine manufacturing companies must speed up production and share their technology and expertise with the developing countries for adequate vaccine supply.”
He proposed five steps to supplement efforts of D8 during the present testing times. “We must mobilize finances and resources to recover robustly from the economic and health crises induced by coronavirus pandemic,” he added
He said in order to address the unique financial and economic crises faced by developing countries as a result of the pandemic, he had suggested a five-point plan, including debt relief, creation and re-distribution of special drawing rights, mobilization of climate finance, elimination of illicit financial flows and return of stolen assets to the developing countries.
The prime minister invited the leadership of D8 countries to consider his five points and join in advocacy for the Covid related relief measures. He said the D8 must take concrete actions for expanding intra D8 trade from currently around $ 100 billion to $ 500 billion by the year 2030. It should include measures like simplification of border procedures, enhancing of institutional linkages and operationalizing new initiatives, he added.
Imran Khan welcomed ideas like D8 payment card, which would enable transactions in local currency. He urged the D-8 to develop a “Youth Engagement Strategy” focused on promoting cultural, educational, and scientific and business exchanges. “Linkages should be established between educational institutions through scholarships, skills development, trainings, fellowships, joint research, and exchange programmes for the youth, particularly in the field of science, technology and innovation.”
He said the technological development was a gateway to economic prosperity, particularly in the post-pandemic period when reliance on technology would be greater than ever before in human history.
“To remain competitive, we must promote knowledge-based economies, increase expenditure on research and development, and focus on rapid digitalization. Pakistan has recently hosted the inaugural meeting of the D-8 Network of Pioneers for Research and Innovation (NPRI).”
