Every day I read many social issues on the internet. In a world where everyone is concerned about gender discrimination, rape, women rights, etc. but no one gears up to talk about a very important issue which for me right now is: brain drain. What is brain drain? Has anyone until now thought of it? How it’s slowly eating up Pakistani economy? Sadly, the answer is no. In fact, most of the people don’t even know about it. Let me start with what it means. Brain drain is immigration of skilled people from one country to another. Through this blog I would like to highlight a major issue faced by our homeland; Pakistan. Our society is one of those unfortunate societies where ‘Brain Drain’ is on a massive scale. This particular flight of human capital started back in the 1970’s and now almost over 6 million of Pakistani residents have left the country for their bright future elsewhere. We should discover details why most of the skilled and even non-skilled Pakistanis want to go overseas rather than serving their own country? The last decade has seen an increase in the international mobility of greatly skilled individuals. This international movement of human capital can be identified, in practice, as the movement of specialists across boundaries.
Let’s consider the situation of brain drain in Pakistan; at present, the migration of professionals to foreign countries has enlarged in recent years. Young, refined, and capable Pakistani professionals have either left the country or are planning to do so. I went through many surveys which display that competent professionals and university graduates want to leave the country; in hunt of better prospects. This condition hinders the government from attaining its anticipated goals.
I found out conditions which motivates our workers to go abroad which are; Low income at home, absence of research facilities, employment discrimination, poor working conditions, political unrest, slow promotion process, mutilation of merit and finally, lucrative incentives by foreign countries.
When it comes from taking Pakistan we always want more and we are always ungrateful of whatever it has given us. But, the sad reality is that we have taken so much from it and we have given back nothing to it. We study and we leave ignoring the consequences of brain drain phenomenon which are disastrous. It involves loss of strategic manpower from significant positions. It severely affects skill development and involves the loss of money invested in education and training. I believe, the loss of strategic manpower disturbs education, research & training, infrastructure building, creative talent, present and future technology and the whole scholarly milieu of a country and forms a growth retarding backwash effect.
According to my research, skillful individuals constitute a very scarce resource for poor countries. In fact, countless countries have lost their best brains to the industrial world and have had to import costly specialists from abroad. Another main implication of the brain drain is that investment in education in an emerging country may not lead to quicker economic development if a huge number of its extremely refined people leave the country. The disastrous effects of brain drain include; less tax revenue, decline in competitiveness, lower labor supply, loss of potential entrepreneurs, shortage of key skilled workers which all in turn reduces confidence in the economy and eats it up.
Conclusively, the eradication of brain drain will not only upgrade our economy as whole but will also develop our nation on individual basis which in return will provide us wonderful living standards, it will also help our beloved Pakistan fall under the category of developed economies.
Through this blog, I urge the readers to give it a serious thought. We as youth of Pakistan need to come forward and take control. We have to build, create and innovate, thus helping this country grow and prosper. Most of us sit at home, get inspired and then lose the motivation because the excuses come too easily. The most oft asked question is what do I do? Well, I have one suggestion in mind: Change your thinking and show willingness to work towards change. Because I believe that we youthful citizens of Pakistan can contribute to a greater cost if we learn to utilize our abilities well. So that we can join the greater countries in this war of survival.Pakistan Zindabad!
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