Germany offers great prospects to Pakistanis: Envoy
German Ambassador Bernhard Schlagheck has said that his country offered great prospects to the Pakistani students for getting higher education as its educational institutions were keen to enhance bilateral relationship with their Pakistani counterparts. The German scholarships providing institutions were focusing on technical education and trying to assist the students to broaden their academic exposure and the Pakistani students could avail the opportunities, he said while addressing a day-long seminar on "Opportunities for Students and Researchers in Germany" here at the International Islamic University Islamabad (IIUI).
The seminar was jointly organized by the IIUI's Department of Translation and Interpretation (T&I) and Students' Advisor Office. The ambassador said "Pakistan and Germany have strong bilateral relations since 1951 and (their) mutual cooperation is increasing day by day." Around 90,000 Pakistani diaspora were an important part of the German society, who were playing an active role in the development of Germany, he added.
He said Germany was keen to enhance bilateral cooperation with Pakistan in the fields of sustainable economy, governance and strategic aspects.
He noted that besides the local youth, the IIU was imparting education to students from over 40 countries and hailed its eagerness for having collaboration with foreign universities. Addressing the inaugural session, IIUI President Prof Dr Ahmad Yousif Al-Draiweesh said the Islamic University was working to promote relations with higher education institutions around the world. There was need to enhance the quality of education globally and to transform more experiences within universities for the improvement of teaching and learning system, he added.
He said Islam was a religion of peace and harmony and the IIUI was trying to promote those teachings. First Secretary and Head of Press and Cultural Section of German Embassy Christine Rosenberger, in her address, shed light on 'life in Germany: culture, multilingualism and norms'. She stressed on the promotion of culture and economic activities of a specific country vis a vis their importance for progress and development of its people.
An official of German Academic Exchange Service or DAAD (German: Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst) presented a detailed paper about study and research opportunities for students in Germany.
Prime Minister Youth Affairs Programme (PMYAP) has planned to launch "Start-up Pakistan Programme" under "Kamyab Jawan Programme" to learn new technologies by engaging 100,000 students. According to an official sources, the objective of the said programme was to train one million students from different universities and technical colleges across the country.
He said that the programme would provide support to all universities and vocational training centres in developing capacity in incubation services which will offer students to start their own business.
He said that the programme would provide essential funding to Higher Education Commission (HEC) and National Vocational and Technical Training Commission (NAVTTC) to accelerate the expansion of Business Incubation Centres (BICs).
HEC's BICs will provide 500,000 trainings in entrepreneurship and would provide blended incubation for all HEC accredited universities across the country to graduate 5,000 start-ups from BICs, he said. He said that NAVTIC would also provide trainings to 500,000 youths in entrepreneurship and blended incubation for top 300 technical training centres across country.