ISLAMABAD: Focal person on Startup Pakistan Shahzad Gul said the free online entrepreneurship training programme is aimed at providing direction, support and an enabling environment to the citizens and private sectors to implement training for skill development to enhance social and economic development.

According to a statement, he said to make the best of students’ time during the coronavirus pandemic NAVTTC in collaboration with Kamyab Jawan Startup Pakistan has arranged a free online entrepreneurship training programme in which students enrolled under Kamyab Jawan Hunarmand Pakistan would get access to the first cohort.

He said students who applied by April 20, 2020, would be considered for the current course. For students applying after April 20, the next course will start after three months.

“In the current situation, startups will be critical in getting our economy back on track and a success story of online education like this could go a long way in building confidence,” he added.

He said free training will be conducted by the digital incubator IdeaGist and the cohort programme comprises four stages - training, ideation, incubation and launch.

“We have a number of mentors who are actually overseas Pakistanis, each having minimum experience of five years in various fields. We encourage overseas Pakistani professionals to help Pakistan in some way to join our community through www.empowerpakistan.org and help these students by sparing few hours per week,” he added.

Published in Dawn, April 21st, 2020