The projects approved at the meeting cover the training of government servants, end users, system administrators, and the setting up of a resource centre. During the meeting, the federal minister for IT directed the Pakistan Computer Bureau (PCB) to aggressively launch the training of government servants throughout the country. In a statement following the meeting, the minister said the projects were sure to increase efficiency of the government employees after their training in the IT skills. “From the experiences of developed countries that have already implemented e-government programmes, it is established that change management and the human factor are the most challenging aspects of e-government,’’ he said.
He said that “some countries have learnt this the hard way by investing millions of dollars in equipment before they were ready to use it,” he said, adding the equipment became obsolete very rapidly and had to be replaced when the people were in a position to use it. “Pakistan is obviously not going to make this mistake and will ensure that public funds are utilized to the maximum.”
Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari said that Pakistan Computer Bureau had already completed the basic IT training of nearly 15,000 government employees and would be training another 10,000 employees in all the four provinces and AJK during the ongoing phase of the training programme. “This training will not only cover the basic IT usage on common platforms but also the use of Open Source Software,” he said, describing the open source as a viable alternate to more expensive proprietary solutions which many countries, including China, were also pursuing as a hands-down route.
He further explained that the use of open source softwares was also playing its part in reducing the use of unlicensed software and copyright violations. “In order to make use of Open Source indigenous capability has to be developed in supporting these systems,” he said.
The minister said he had also directed Pakistan Computer Bureau to start training programs in open source software that would include the training of 100 system administrators and 1000 end users in the first phase. “The training is to be conducted in collaboration with major open source vendors so that the trainees can get internationally accepted certification,” he said.
During the meeting, the minister also approved the establishment of an open source resource centre to support the local IT industry in developing solutions on the open source platform and help the organizations migrating to open source. The open source research centre will provide information on how to deploy open source systems, locate resources, and give guidance on compatibility and standards.
Quelle: Pakistan Link
