Faad Waheed, Acting President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ICCI) said that SMEs are the backbone of the economy and are now increasingly moving towards automation and digitization to improve their productivity, efficiency & cost-effectiveness. He urged that the government should focus on formulating a specific cyber security prevention policy for SMEs to save them from business losses due to cyberattacks. He said this while talking to a delegation of Chinese Cybersecurity solution providers during its visit to ICCI led by Ammar Jafri, former DG FIA and founder of Digital Pakistan.

Faad Waheed said that many SMEs are now going online to expand their outreach to wider markets and improve their business prospects. He said that Pakistan’s National Cyber Security Policy 2021 also encourages promotion of online businesses, however, the policy is lacking in strong defence measures to protect the SMEs from cyber risks and threats. He stressed that the Ministry of Information Technology & Telecom in consultation with stakeholders should develop a specific Cybersecurity Policy for SMEs to facilitate them in going digital. He said that Chinese IT companies providing cybersecurity solutions have great prospects in the Pakistani market and they should take advantage of this untapped market, especially for SMEs by investing in Pakistan.

Ammar Jafri, former DG FIA and Founder of Digital Pakistan said that Pakistan is gearing up for the 5th generation industrial revolution and stressed that the government should develop a strong digital infrastructure to enable businesses to flourish and compete effectively in the international market. He said that the focus of Digital Pakistan is to promote connectivity, improve digital infrastructure, increase investment in digital skills and promote innovation & tech entrepreneurship. He said that cooperation of ICCI with Digital Pakistan would be helpful in promoting digitization in SMEs.

The Chinese delegation members said that their company is one of the top cybersecurity solution providers with offices in Asia, South Asia and East Africa. They said that they want to introduce their cybersecurity solutions in Pakistan for business enterprises to save them from business losses due to cyberattacks.

Maqsood Tabish Acting Senior Vice President and Faizan Shehzad Acting Vice President ICCI said that SMEs are vulnerable to cyberattacks in Pakistan as they don’t have strong technological defenses in place and hoped that the Chinese IT companies would invest in Pakistan to provide sustainable cybersecurity solutions to these businesses and assured that ICCI would fully cooperate with them in such efforts.