By 2023, Artificial Intelligence (AI) had become a global driver of economic competitiveness and public service delivery. However, in Pakistan, the adoption of AI in the public sector remained fragmented, despite growing awareness of its potential. While pockets of innovation existed in healthcare, taxation, and security, the overall pace was slow, constrained by outdated infrastructure, limited human capital, and bureaucratic inertia.

AI in Government: The Missed Opportunity

Pakistan's public sector, which employs over 3.9 million people, struggled to embed AI meaningfully in decision-making or service delivery. Despite the Digital Pakistan Policy (2018) and Pakistan Vision 2025, there was no dedicated national AI framework or strategic roadmap by 2023. Most public sector departments continued to rely on legacy systems, with digital transformation largely confined to website upgrades or online forms.

This underutilization stood in contrast to regional peers like India and UAE, which had launched national AI strategies and deployed machine learning in everything from citizen services to judicial processes.

Health and Education: Nascent Use Cases

Some promising examples existed:

The Ministry of National Health Services collaborated with National Incubation Center (NIC) Islamabad and HealthWire to explore AI in disease pattern recognition and patient triage systems.

The Punjab IT Board (PITB) experimented with AI models for predicting school dropout rates using socio-economic and attendance data.

AI-based biometric verification systems were explored in NADRA to improve national database accuracy and eliminate duplicate entries.

However, these initiatives were pilot-scale, often short-lived due to budgetary constraints or lack of trained personnel.

Skills Shortage and Institutional Barriers

A significant barrier to AI adoption was the lack of AI-specific expertise in government institutions. A 2022 report by the Pakistan Software Export Board (PSEB) noted that less than 2% of public sector IT professionals had formal AI or data science training.

Furthermore, departments lacked access to clean, structured datasets, a prerequisite for machine learning applications. Institutional silos and poor data governance further limited the potential for interoperability and algorithm development.

In contrast, Pakistan’s private sector—particularly startups and telecom companies—made faster progress, leveraging AI for customer service automation, fraud detection, and predictive analytics.

The Role of Academia and Think Tanks

In 2023, several universities, including Namal Institute, LUMS, and FAST-NU, expanded their AI and machine learning programs. These institutions began collaborating with government departments, albeit on a small scale.

Think tanks such as Tabadlab and PIDE advocated for an AI policy that prioritized:

Data governance frameworks

Skills development programs

Ethical guidelines and accountability mechanisms

Cross-sector collaboration

Despite these calls, institutional inertia remained a major challenge.

Regional Disparities and Connectivity Issues

Even where government bodies showed willingness to adopt AI, regional disparities in digital infrastructure—especially in Balochistan, Gilgit-Baltistan, and parts of KP—hindered implementation.

Broadband penetration in these areas was still below 30% in 2023 (PTA), making real-time data collection and cloud-based AI models difficult to deploy.

Outlook and Recommendations

Experts suggest that Pakistan must:

Launch a national AI strategy, modeled after countries like India or Canada.

Establish AI centers of excellence in collaboration with academia.

Create public-private task forces to scale successful pilot projects.

Introduce mandatory AI training for civil servants in technology-relevant departments.

Set aside a dedicated AI innovation fund under the Ministry of IT and Telecom.

Conclusion

In 2023, Pakistan stood at the cusp of an AI transformation but lacked the unified vision, policy framework, and institutional coordination to harness it fully. While civil society, startups, and academia pushed the envelope, the public sector remained a laggard—missing an opportunity to transform service delivery and governance through intelligent systems.

References:

Pakistan Software Export Board – Annual Industry Report 2022

Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) – Broadband Penetration Data (2023)

Ministry of IT & Telecom – Digital Pakistan Policy (2018)

Tabadlab – AI in Governance: A Policy Blueprint for Pakistan (2023)

The Express Tribune – AI Integration in Public Sector: Why Pakistan Is Falling Behind (March 2023)

PITB – Annual Review 2022–2023

LUMS Center for Data Science – Industry Collaborations 2023