Did you know just 5% of the total Youth population of Pakistan can bring home $26 Billion per annum through freelancing? This number alone is greater than the total exports of Pakistan. All we need is a “3M Freelancers Tsunami” project just like the “10 Billion Tree Tsunami” initiative.
Let’s do some math:
Youth Population of Pakistan (29%): 58M
5% of Youth starts Freelancing: 58M x 5% = 2.9M freelancers
Avg. Annual Income per Freelancer: $9,000
Total Annual Income: 2.9M freelancers x $9,000 = $26.1 Billions
For every 580k freelancers, there is going to be an increment of $5.2 Billion in total annual IT exports.
5% of Youth starts Freelancing: 58M x 5% = 2.9M freelancers
Avg. Annual Income per Freelancer: $9,000
Total Annual Income: 2.9M freelancers x $9,000 = $26.1 Billions
For every 580k freelancers, there is going to be an increment of $5.2 Billion in total annual IT exports.
Here is the 5 years projection table:
| Yr1 | Yr2 | Yr3 | Yr4 | Yr5 | |
| Total Population | 200M | 200M | 200M | 200M | 200M |
| 29% Youth (15- 29 Yrs) | 58M | 58M | 58M | 58M | 58M |
| Yearly New Freelancers % | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% |
| Total No. of Freelancer | 0.58M | 1.16M | 1.74M | 2.32M | 2.9M |
| Avg. Income per person | $9,000 | $9,000 | $9,000 | $9,000 | $9,000 |
| Total Annual Income | $5.22B | $10.44B | $15.66B | $20.88B | $26.10B |
In the above projection, few safe assumptions have been considered – for example youth population and monthly average income are considered constant and at the least – but it is highly likely that these numbers will rise in the coming years.
Now, the question is, how to produce this number of new freelancers every year?
Producing Five Lac and Eighty Thousand tech freelancers in a year won’t be a child’s play but through a combined effort of Government and Youth, it can be achieved. Pakistan needs a national level tech skills development and employability platform. It’s essential that it’s run by the private sector to enable rapid growth but Government’s endorsement is a must.
The gamification based platform needs to take the follow a 5-step framework:
Step-1: Career Track Setting
The first mistake that youngsters make is not exploring their true passion and potential. Instead, they just follow what is highly demanded and highly paid. They need immediate guidance through career coaching, mentorship by industry experts and career training. Furthermore, they need to have a clear career roadmap of at least the next 5 years.
Step-2: Skills Development
The next step is to provide them skills training as per their road-map. The skills can be acquired in various ways i.e. through industry led training bootcamps, and private tuitions etc.
Step-3: Pre-Assessments
Helping tech professionals to showcase themselves in a manner so it is quick and easy for the employer to hire them. Pre-evaluation techniques can be adopted where the industry professionals interview the upcoming talent and grade their profiles. Furthermore, international certifications are also a good proof of candidates’ skillset.
Step-4: Opening Network Opportunities
It is very important to encourage the youth to network with the right people to get help and advice. Pakistan doesn’t have any of their own professional networking platforms. Furthermore, there needs to be frequent events and meetups where like minded people can gather and share their knowledge with others.
Step-5: Finding Work
Once all the previous 4 steps are accomplished gracefully, this step gets very easy. There are platforms through which the individuals can find work online. But the Government can also play an important role in promoting its talent globally.
We, at Dice Analytics, have been using this model for the past 5 years and it has proven to be very successful and can be scaled at the national level.
This article is eye opening. The fact-backed information is too good to learn. I must say, so much opportunity in Pakistan, wow!. I would like to add in this discourse. With current economic situation in Pakistan, our financial security is at risk. In these times, calling out and training youth to pursue independent work is no less than a ‘holy grail’. May the goal is reached!
Do dice analytics have sessions on how to do freelance as a Data Scientist?
Since freelancing is somewhat confusing in this field.
Hello Musa,
We do conduct webinars on such topics on and off. You may check out our recent webinar on ‘Freelancing in Machine Learning and Data Science’ through the link: https://youtu.be/Vx7OU61N7ZE
You may as well stay tuned to our social media channels for future webinars.