Pakistan needs a knowledge-driven economy, says Prof Atta-ur-Rahman

Pakistan currently has a natural resource-based economy and to emerge as a strong nation we need to make education, science, technology, innovation and entrepreneurship the key drivers of socio-economic development.

By 2025, 12 disruptive technologies would make an impact around the world and it is suggested that they would generate revenue of around $100 trillion. The local experts should focus on advanced robotics, autonomous and near-autonomous vehicles, next-generation genomics, energy storage, mobile internet, automation of knowledge work, internet of things, cloud, 3D printing, advanced materials, advanced oil and gas exploration and recovery and renewable energy to become a part of that gigantic global economic output.

These views were expressed by the chairman of the Prime Minister’s National Task Force on Science and Technology, Professor Dr Atta-ur-Rahman, on Saturday. He was the chief guest at the opening session of the two-day second International Conference on Information Science and Communication Technology.

The ICISCT 20 has been organised by the Department of Computer Science, University of Karachi, at the Professor Salimuzzaman Auditorium, Hussain Ebrahim Jamal Research Institute of Chemistry, KU.

Prof Rahman He informed the audience that the Pakistani government would spend around Rs50 billion in areas such as artificial intelligence, IoT, big data, cybersecurity and related technologies. He shared that all government software contracts would only go to local companies to boost local business and special technology zones would be established.

“Knowledge is now the main driving force of world economics and Singapore, which is only 865 square kilometers in size with a five million population, has exports of around $330 billion and it focuses on human resources and high-tech exports.”

Meanwhile, the guest of honour, Member of the National Assembly Dr Syeda Shahida Rehmani, said that information technology was changing the world.

“It is influencing the way we think, the way we behave and the way we do our tasks, which is why the tools offered information and communication technology should be studied and adapted as soon as possible and as efficiently as possible, so that we, as a country, can keep up our pace with the rest of the world.”

She said that only a very small per cent graduated from the university with a bachelor’s degree, and this put a heavy responsibility on the educated person to play a positive role in the economy and overall productivity of the country.

Dr Shahida Rehmani mentioned that the culture of academic conferences was popular all over the world and had recently been on the rise in Pakistan as well.

KU Vice Chancellor Professor Dr Khalid Mahmood Iraqi said that this conference had offered us the opportunity to join hands together for shaping the future of sustainable development in the area of information and communication technology.

He observed that development and growth supported by research and knowledge were the prime responsibilities of universities towards their societies. He mentioned that communication was the most prominent sphere having come up with amazing phenomena almost in each part of the global village.

He said that unprecedented advancements in IT and communications had their strong impact on social, economic, political and all other fields of our life. This tremendous progress, at the same time, placed a sense of responsibility of maintaining equitable, just and a sustainable environment all over, he added.

“Today’s life is rapidly becoming largely reliant on knowledge-based technologies. The information technology has overwhelmingly influenced the entire world and the global ecology. The ultimate outcome of any progress is destined to go in favor of humanity, in favor of humans. From society to society the perception of technological progress sometimes varies.”

Chairman DSC KU Professor Dr Muhammad Sadiq Ali Khan informed that conference would cover a variety of topic such as algorithm, AI, communication and networks, IoT, cloud computing and big data, theoretical computer science and software system, nano technology, information security, and cybersecurity, energy-efficient system in computer, networks, innovative technology and services and others.

He mentioned that the ICISCT aimed to bridge the communication gap between academics and professionals locally and internationally. Conference Co-Chair Professor Dr BS Chowdhry said that the ICISCT was providing a platform which brought together leading academicians, researchers and scholars to exchange and share their latest research results on all aspects of information sciences and communication technology.

Professor Dr Jonathan Andrew Ware from the University of South Wales, United Kingdom, while presenting his keynote address, shared that worldwide, maintaining the health and safety of construction workers was a major problem. In the UK construction industry alone, an ongoing unacceptable average of nearly 39 people is killed each year and countless others seriously injured. To help reduce the risks, various countries have adopted a range of methodologies and approaches to help foresee potential problems and put in place measures to mitigate against them.

In the United Kingdom, Risk Assessment Method Statements (RAMS) are widely used as a means of helping to manage construction work and to help ensure that the necessary precautions have been communicated to those involved. RAMS are reviewed by various people in the chain-of-command of a construction project before being signed off.

However, this review process is not without significant issues. One of these issues is the inconsistent understanding, review, development and dissemination of the RAMS. To overcome some of the problems associated with the review of RAMS a tripartite partnership between Aurora International Consulting, IBM Watson, and the University of South Wales, are developing an Artificial Intelligence enabled RAMS review system that helps facilitate ‘textbook’ safety review every time.

A fully functioning version of the prototype has the potential to revolutionize safety in the industry worldwide. Through the development of the prototype, it has been demonstrated that IBM Watson technologies provide a suitable tool kit to facilitate the analysis of the textual information held in RAMS.

Another keynote speaker, Dr Jim Buckley, senior lecturer in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Limerick, Ireland, focuses on helping software developers to undertake the complex tasks required by them when developing and maintaining software systems.

He mentioned that there are a huge amount of legacy information systems in use today and, as a society, we depend on them immensely and surprisingly, many of the organisations behind these legacy software systems struggle to support them due, in part, to their large, complex and highly-coupled nature.

He narrated that if we look at some of the problems developers face when dealing with such systems, during software maintenance and evolution. It will describe a methodology (action research) that we have found useful in identifying their most pressing concerns and addressing them, based on in-situ, iterative refinement of prototype approaches: approaches that have been derived from academic literature and observation of expert practice.

During the first day, Dr Raziq Yaqub from the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Alabama A&M University, Alabama, USA, delivered his keynote address on Cyber Secure Electric Areal Vehicles (drones), while Mohd Helmy Abdul Wahab from the Department of Computer Engineering, University Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, enlightened the audience on ‘Internet-of-things: Moving forward to IR4.0’. Dr D M Akbar Hussain from the Department of Energy Technology Section for Power Electronics Systems presented his keynote address on Bayesian Framework to Determine Strengths and Weaknesses of Nodes in Social Networks.