The government has announced major incentives for the IT and telecom sector in a bid to boost overall growth of the economy.
During a meeting on Tuesday, Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin approved Rs10-billion fund to give cash rewards to IT companies against their exports and offered 5 per cent rebate for IT exports.
According to local media reports, The meeting was briefed that rebate will be provided at the rate of 5pc of exports while 1pc of annual remittances by the IT sector would be allocated to PSEB every year to carry out skills development, capacity enhancement of IT companies, branding, marketing establishment of software technology parks across Pakistan.
It has been decided that the foreign companies will be allowed to repatriation of their profits.
Pakistan Software Export Board (PSEB) Managing Director Osman Nasir said the decision will eventually help increase remittances from the IT services up to $3.5 billion in the ongoing fiscal year against $2.1 billion in 2020-21 only because the multinational companies do not bring back all the earnings back to the country.
“There are many expenditures and payments for the companies around the world but due to restrictions they do not remit all amount into Pakistan, now it has been decided that the foreign companies can repatriate their profits to any foreign country,” he added.
The finance minister has also agreed that the freelancers will be allowed to open a special dollar account to receive payments for their individual IT exports.
The meeting was informed that the industry needs up to 50,000 IT experts annually but we will never grow if the freelancers cannot operate in an open environment.
