Aitizaz Hassan

The Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication (MOITT) is launching a pilot project of High Impact Skills Boot Camps for certain critical new ICT technologies. It is established through service provider on training of trainers (ToT) concept at different locations in Pakistan, initially in Islamabad and Karachi. According to the MOITT, most universities have been unable to timely update curriculum or mobilise resources to cope with rapid demand for certain new technologies like cloud computing, data science and blockchain technology.

The eventual benefits of such skills development by the government will result in export of high value services required by demanding international markets. The boot camp will provide a model course work and methodology to be used as a guideline to universities and other institutions to train students in future and prepare them for software development jobs in the field of cyber security, cloud computing, artificial intelligence (AI) and blockchain technology for the next decade. A spokesperson for the MOITT told WealthPK that it will enable trained resources for high-performance delivery in the field of cyber security.

The jobs are projected to be offered by international and domestic firms, government departments, and institutions that will expand their current operations in Pakistan. The new businesses will be motivated to bring their development in the country. The program will take many of these skilled resources to their home base as employees. The spokesperson said that the boot camp will also be helpful for universities’ curriculum or mobilise resources to cope with the rapid demand for certain critical new technologies like cyber security. After the program, the participants should also be able to find jobs both in the public and private sectors domestically.

Currently, many of these jobs have been exported to other countries. Training boot camps will be conducted under the direct supervision of certified and experienced expert instructors. The training type is based on a very popular and successful model used in the United States for bridging the skills gap. According to course details, the introduction of blockchain technology, the basics and available blockchain development and deployment platforms, including Hyper Ledger, Ethereum and Corda, will be part of the training. It includes public and private blockchain network development and deployment using Hyper Ledger Fabric, Ethereum Smart Contracts and business logic development and deployment on blockchain networks.

Commercial deployment and testing of blockchain distributed applications(dApps) will also be part of the boot camp. Further, Hyper Ledger Fabric basics, understanding Hyper Ledger assets, introduction to Hyper Ledger blockchain client development, frontend development, deployment and testing will also be considered. The blockchain course will also cover dApps, introduction to the Ethereum virtual machine, using solidity for Ethereum virtual machine, introduction to smart contract, security and deployment of smart contract, public and private Ethereum dApps, operations and maintenance tips and tricks.

Credit : Independent News Pakistan-WealthPk