LAHORE:A special web portal https://web3.punjab.gov.pk was launched on Monday for the registration of Web 3.0 contributors including researchers, scientists and IT industry experts.
National and international companies working with Web 3.0 technology would also be able to submit their valuable feedback through the portal, said a handout issued here.
The portal was launched during the first meeting of the high-powered committee constituted by Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Parvez Elahi on adoption of Web 3.0 in the province. The meeting was held at Arfa Software Technology Park, presided by Punjab Finance Minister Mohsin Leghari and Punjab Information Technology Minister Dr Arslan Khalid.
Punjab Information and Technology Board (PITB) Chairman Syed Bilal Haider, Policy and Domain Expert Dr Hussain Nadim, Information and Communication Technology Industry Experts including Anooshay Shaigan, Sabina Zafar, Badar Khushnood and Faisal Chaudhry were present in the meeting. Others included NetSol Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Salim Ghauri, Systems CEO Asif Pir, Techlogix CEO Salman Akhtar, STEPS CEO Umar Farooq, P@SHA Chairman Zohaib Khan, ITU VC Dr Sarfraz Khurshid, representatives from State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), National Bank of Pakistan, Bank of Punjab, Federal Board of Revenue, Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan and PITB DG e-Governance Sajid Latif.
Expressing his views, Punjab Finance Minister Mohsin Leghari said that the complete adoption of Web 3.0 would create job opportunities leading to economic growth and rise in gross domestic product. “Tourism, education, government services, retail and real estate would be the main beneficiaries of the new technology,” he added.
Punjab IT Minister Dr Arslan Khalid remarked that the technologies like Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning etc were the backbone of Web 3.0 and afford more personalisation and security to internet users around the globe.
“Adoption of Web 3.0 in the province would facilitate more interactivity between different users and websites enabling them to access content from multiple sources at the same time, without having to leave the website they were surfing at any point in time,” he added.
PITB Chairman Syed Bilal Haider was very optimistic about the development and stated, “Web 3.0 will enable PITB to buy lounges in Metaverse to hold meetings/sign agreements. Citizens would be able to use Metaverse to interact with the government.” He further said that with the support of SBP in adopting the Web 3.0 ecosystem, payments could also be made in the form of non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
PITB DG e-Governance Sajid Latif gave a comprehensive presentation on terms of references (TORs), constitution of sub-committees, proposal for addition of co-opted members, tentative road map and a brief introduction of Web 3.0 portal.
Under Web 3.0, avenues in ‘new economy’, ‘tech R&D’ would be explored and a pool of new talent would be created that can be part of the Web 3.0 ecosystem.
Web 3.0 was the third iteration of internet that combines technologies like Blockchain, Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), Cloud, Edge, Internet of Things (IoT), Geolocation tech & 5G etc. The underlying Blockchain technology provides virtually foolproof data security.