PESHAWAR: Minister for information technology Mohammad Atif Khan has said the provincial government will spend Rs8 billion on imparting basic, medium and advanced level digital skills to 100,000 youth.

He announced this while addressing the graduation ceremony of 300 women, who were trained under the digital skills internship programme, according to a statement issued here on Tuesday.

Mr Khan said training of 100,000 youth would add Rs21 billion annually to the province’s economy. He said providing training to youth in IT was the top priority of the provincial government. The minister asked the youth to equip themselves with digital skills so as to be able to compete in the market.

KP Youth Employment Programme is a flagship project of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Information Technology Board (KPITB), under which 11,700 graduates have been provided training in digital skills, he said.

The minister said 3,300 women were trained under digital skills programme, and 2,000 youth under the digital internship programme.

Atif Khan said four special technology zones were going to be established in the province soon for promotion of IT sector.

On the occasion, KPITB managing director Sahibzada Ali Mehmood said there were numerous opportunities in the digital economy, and importance of learning digital skills had increased manifold after onset of Covid-19 pandemic.

Published in Dawn, January 12th, 2022