ISLAMABAD: The World Bank recently flagged significant implementation gaps in Pakistan’s Digital Economy Enhancement Project (DEEP). According to newly reviewed documents, the project suffers from severely slow financial disbursement.
Currently, the initiative operates with a revised financing pool of $69.16 million.
However, authorities have only disbursed $8.36 million, making up just 12.09% of the total amount. A massive $60.80 million remains undisbursed. DEEP originally secured approval in March 2024 and became effective in May 2024. Its scheduled closing date remains July 31, 2028.
Despite these glaring financial delays, the World Bank maintained a “Moderately Satisfactory” assessment for both the project’s overall implementation and its progress toward development objectives. Furthermore, the overall risk rating currently stands at “Moderate”.
DEEP is an ambitious project that aims to drastically enhance the government’s capacity to deliver digitally enabled public services to citizens and businesses. The initiative features four main components.
First, improving digital economy, governance, and service delivery capabilities will cost an estimated $58 million. Next, the development of the Pakistan Business Portal requires $15 million. Finally, project management operations account for a further $5 million.
Key Achievements & Major Shortfalls
The World Bank clearly acknowledged several important advances in establishing the country’s digital public infrastructure. For example, the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) successfully issued 2.3 million Digital IDs. Additionally, the National Data Exchange Layer processed a total of 6.5 million transactions.
The PakID Vault now successfully holds 11 types of verifiable credentials. Simultaneously, officials completed the Enterprise Architecture Framework and disclosed the Data Governance Policy for public consultation. Currently, 18 services are available on the national citizen services portal, trailing just slightly behind the target of 20.
However, major shortfalls continue to hinder overall progress. For instance, transactions through the National Data Exchange Layer stood at only 650,000 in August 2026. This falls severely behind the massive closing-period target of 13.333 million.
Moreover, only six government entities have integrated with the national data exchanger against a target of 40 by November 2027. Private-sector integration also lags significantly, with just one entity integrated against a target of 13. Furthermore, the PakID Vault’s 11 verifiable credentials fall short of the 40-credential target.
Similarly, the Pakistan Business Portal has processed zero Registration, Licenses, Certificates, and Other (RLCOs) transactions. DEEP specifically targets 4,000 annual transactions by November 2027. Online B2G payments and RLCO services also sit at zero against a 50% target. In terms of user demographics, women make up only 9.2% of digitally enabled service users, missing the 30% target. Meanwhile, youth user data remains entirely unavailable.
Urgent Strategy Overhaul Needed
To correct this trajectory, the World Bank outlined strict requirements. Working under the institutional arrangements of the Digital Nation Pakistan Act 2025, the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication (MoITT) must immediately prepare a time-bound service prioritization and onboarding strategy. This strategy must explicitly cover the next six months, one year, and two years. MoITT must coordinate this critical effort alongside the Pakistan Digital Authority (PDA) as well as federal and provincial governments.
Additionally, the ministry must formally publish the Enterprise Architecture Framework alongside a clear adoption roadmap. It also needs to formally adopt and operationalize the Data Governance Policy and Interoperability Framework. Furthermore, completing the feasibility study for the pending National Fiberization Plan remains another outstanding requirement.
Ultimately, Pakistan has made visible progress in laying a digital infrastructure foundation. However, DEEP faces a substantial uphill battle to translate these core systems into widespread, fully operational digital public services before the July 2028 deadline.
