Faad Waheed, Acting President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry (ICCI) said that remittances of the Overseas Pakistanis are the backbone of the national economy as they account for more than total exports of goods and services annually and contribute significantly to improving the country’s foreign reserves. He stressed that to further increase the volume of foreign exchange reserves, the government should make strong efforts to explore new markets for increasing the export of manpower across the globe that would help improve the foreign exchange and the overall economy. He said this while talking to Muhammad Jawad Sohrab Malik, Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resource Development during a meeting with him along with Asad Hafeez Kiyani Chairman, Shakeel Ahmed Abbasi Vice Chairman and Faheem Iqbal Chaudhry former Senior Vice Chairman, Pakistan Overseas Employment Promoters Association (POEPA).

Faad Waheed said that Pakistan is the 5th largest country of the world in terms of population with a large pool of human resource and stressed that the government should equip its manpower with the latest skills and knowledge to improve their prospects of their export to potential markets. He said that Bangladesh has exported over 1100,000 workers during the year ending June 2023, but Pakistan’s export of manpower during the 11 months of the outgoing fiscal year remained just around 372000, which is not an impressive figure. He said that many countries in the Middle East, Europe, South East Asia are in high demand of skilled labor and the government should provide the demand-driven skills to its workforce that would increase their export and strengthen the economy.

Muhammad Jawad Sohrab Malik, Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resource Development said that the government is determined to harness the the potential of a substantial Pakistani workforce to realize the goal of fast economic revival. He said that during a recent meeting with the Saudi Ambassador, he proposed the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to employ a substantial number of Pakistani workers to contribute to the Saudi Vision 2030. He said that Pakistan has the ability to export one million workers every year to various potential markets and all possible efforts are being made to realize this goal to strengthen the economy.

Asad Hafeez Kiyani Chairman, Shakeel Ahmed Abbasi Vice Chairman and Faheem Iqbal Chaudhry former Senior Vice Chairman, Pakistan Overseas Employment Promoters Association also spoke on the occasion and shared useful ideas to explore the possibilities for creating new employment opportunities for Pakistanis around the world. They assured of their full cooperation to the government in achieving this goal.