The Office of Research, Innovation and Commercialization (ORIC) at the Institute of Business Management (IoBM) organized a Seminar on “CPEC: Challenges for SMEs” in collaboration with Small and Medium Enterprise Development Authority (SMEDA) on Tuesday, November 27, 2018 at the Entrepreneurship and Management Excellence Center (EMEC), IoBM. Present on this occasion were IoBM’s Mr. Talib Karim, President, Dr. Ejaz Ahmed, Rector, Prof Dr. Amanat Ali Jalbani, Advisor to President and HoD, Office of Research, Innovation and Commercialization (ORIC) and Office of Graduate Studies (OGS), Dr. Shahid Amjad, HoD, Environment and Energy Management, Syed Hasan Habib, Senior Fellow, Center for Policy and Area Studies Department, Mr. Muhammad Tariq, Coordinator and Assistant Manager, ORIC, Mr. Sharique Ayubi, Associate Professor, Accounting and Finance, Ms. Farah Habib, Research Coordinator, ORIC-IoBM. It was well-attended by IoBM faculty, MPhil and PhD students.
The objective of this Seminar was to discuss Industry Perspective of CPEC, Challenges for Small and Medium Enterprises and Future Perspective of CPEC. As China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) is opening attractive avenues for investment emerging from economic cooperation between Pakistan and China many projects have entered their realization phase. A number of projects are being developed on fast-track as part of the Early Harvest Projects with multiple business opportunities across the value chains of industry set to open up.
Mr. Talib Karim, President IoBM shared with CPEC think-tank to focus on how should our human resource and concerned industries benefit from CPEC as it has good promise and potential for our economy, for our economic corridor and for building highways to benefit SMEs all along. Prof. Dr. Amanat Ali Jalbani shared whatever the nature of apprehensions, confusions or misunderstandings about CPEC, it is a win-win prospect for Pakistan. Be it energy, environment, agriculture, industry، trade, commerce, science and technology, CPEC projects carry promise and potential for Pakistan. Dr. Manzoor Isran, Professor of Management Sciences, SZABIST, proposed three options for SMEs depending on the requirements of a country such as resource-seeking, market-seeking and structure asset seeking and advocated resource-seeking as a suitable option for Pakistan. Mr. Mashood Ali Khan, Chairman, PAPS 2019 and Director Production, Mehran Commercial Enterprises, believed in “making Pakistan the next engineering destination of the world”, inquiring when Germany and Japan are models of engineering and technology, why can’t Pakistan! Mr. Mukesh Kumar, Provincial Chief, SMEDA Sindh, while wrapping up the Seminar, said as private and public sectors think, plan and endeavor on strategies for CPEC, what will make a positive difference is the role of university students, faculty and university-industry partnership.
Parvez Jamil – 021-35091905 – 0324-2899563 – 0334-3013971 – parvez@iobm.edu.pk
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