Ahsan stresses need to prepare for future challenges

ISLAMABAD, Mar 16 (APP):Minister for Interior Ahsan Iqbal Friday said there was need to prepare for future challenges though the economy was moving in the right direction due to revolutionary measures taken by the incumbent government in various sectors, including energy, economy, technology, health, infrastructure and education.
Addressing the inaugural ceremony of National Center of Artificial Intelligence here at the National University of Science and Technology (NUST), the minister said today other countries desired to work with Pakistan, especially in the wake of China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).
Pakistan, however, still needed to adopt the latest technology to meet modern day challenges and keep pace with the fast moving world, he added.
Ahsan Iqbal, who is also Minister for Planning, Development, and Reforms, said the latest telecom technology, including of 3G and 4G, were impacting the socio-economic life of the people positively, for which innovative approach would have to be adopted.
He said peace had been restored in the country and the terrorists were on the run, which was evident from the fact that people in the far flung areas of Balochistan had celebrated the Independence Day with usual enthusiasm last year.
He said the government was also trying to to launch development project even in the remotest areas of the country. It was the incumbent government, which had made it to exploit the precious Thar coal and electricity generation would be started from it by the end of current year, which would continue for next 400 years. The coal reserves in Tharparkar could produce energy equal to that of Iran and Saudi Arabia’s oil and gas reserves, he added.
He said so far depth of 120 meters had been achieved in the Thar Coal Mining project and hopefully coal would be excavated in a few months.
The minister said the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz government had fulfilled the promises made during 2013 elections and Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC), a multinational professional services network headquartered in London, had also forecast that if the current pace of development continued, Pakistan would be included in top 20 world economies by 2030.
Earlier, NUST Rector Lieutenant General (retd) Naveed Zaman said the National Center for Artificial Intelligence would become the hub of technological advancement.
He said NUST was playing a key role in development of technology, particularly in the robotics sector of the country.