Pakistan’s Internet Speed Up 60% in Two and a Half Years, IT Minister Says
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s internet speed has risen by 60 percent over the past two and a half years, Federal Minister for Information Technology Shaza Fatima Khawaja said on Tuesday, as the government set out its case for a digitally sovereign Pakistan at the Margalla Dialogue in Islamabad. Data usage, she said, has grown by two terabits per second, taking the country’s total live internet capacity to around seven terabits per second.
Two new submarine cables have been added to strengthen international connectivity, the minister said, while the fibre-optic network has doubled from three million connections to more than six million. Pakistan has also held the largest spectrum auction in its history, offering 480 MHz and lifting total available spectrum from 274 MHz to more than 750 MHz.
1.8 million 5G users and a $1 billion AI bet
5G services have been launched, with around 1.8 million users already subscribed, Khawaja told the gathering. She also announced a $1 billion investment in artificial intelligence, to be spent across infrastructure, skills, innovation and connectivity, and said a Data Governance Policy would be unveiled within the next couple of weeks.
Artificial intelligence, she said, is expected to become a $4.8 trillion global economy by 2033 and to touch around 40 percent of jobs worldwide. The technology would transform work rather than wipe it out, she argued, and people who learn to use it could become up to 100 times more productive than those who do not.
Digital Nation law and a national master plan
The minister pointed to the Digital Nation Pakistan Act, which created the Pakistan Digital Authority, now drawing up a National Digital Master Plan alongside sectoral plans for agriculture, real estate and health technology. Pakistan, she said, is determined to make the global technological transformation — above all the rapid advance of AI — an opportunity for national development rather than a threat to it. She added that the country had also demonstrated its cyber capabilities during last year’s Marka-e-Haq confrontation with India.
