IT, ITeS exports record annual growth rate of 178pc in five years: report

By Muhammad JuniadPublished On 31 Mar 2023

The Information Technology and Telecommunication Ministry submitted a reply to a question raised by MNA Dr Mahreen Razzaq Bhutto in the National Assembly, claiming that Pakistan’s IT and IT-enabled services sector is making a significant contributions to exports and foreign exchange earnings.

Dr Bhutto had asked the IT&T minister about the current value of the country’s IT sector’s annual exports.

According to the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication’s reply, from July to December FY2022-23, export remittances of $1.333 billion have been realized by the IT & ITeS industry, said to be the ‘highest among all services’ at 37.8% of the total export of services, and an increase of 2.4% in comparison to $1.302 billion reported for the same period last year.

During FY2021-22, Information and Communication Technology export remittances surged to $2.615 billion at a growth rate of 24% in comparison to remittance receipts of $2.107 billion in FY2020-21.

The IT & ITeS sector has apparently delivered the largest trade surplus across services and the second-highest across goods and services after the textile sector.

Trade surplus of $1.17 billion (87.47% of the total ICT export remittances) has been realized by the IT & ITeS industry during July to December of FY2022-23 to meet the foreign currency crunch faced by the country. This shows an increase of 19.96%, as compared to trade surplus of $972 million for the same period in FY2021-22.

Over that past five years, a phenomenal upward growth of 178% in the IT & ITeS exports has been reported at a compound annual growth rate of 30%, the highest in comparison to all other local industries in services and even higher than the textile sector, which stands at 148%.

According to the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication report, Pakistan is the second most financially attractive IT & ITeS outsourcing destination in the world, quoting the Kearney’s Global Services Location Index.

Whereas, the International Labour Organization (ILO) has ranked Pakistan as the third largest supplier of digital labour, including clerical and data entry services, creative and multimedia services, professional services, sales and marketing support services, software development and technology services, writing and translation services.

In software development and technology services, Pakistan rates ILO as the second biggest supplier of digital labour.

The IT & ITeS industry is exporting its services to countries where the US is the largest market at 57% of the export remittances receipts; followed by the UK 8%, UAE 7%, Singapore 5%, and Ireland 4%.

The top 20 IT & ITeS export destinations account for 97% of export remittances, and the rest of the countries and territories at present only account only for 3%.