Pakistan registers over 900 companies in a day

ISLAMABAD: Entrepreneurship seems to be blooming in the country as Security and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) sees a sharp increase in registration of new businesses amid an unstable job market. 

According to The News, SECP registered 2,365 new companies in September, showing an increase of 69% compared to September 2019.

The data showed that 68% of companies were registered as private limited companies while 29% were single-member and 3% accounted for unlisted public companies and non-profit ogranisations.

The report says majority of the registrations were done online. Nearly 40% (946) of the companies were registered in 24 hours.

Read more: Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan issues coronavirus advisory

The development comes as Pakistan envisages a GDP growth rate of 1% for the current fiscal year against the contraction of 0.4% in the last fiscal year.

The country’s economy has also started showing early signs of recovery with key indicators hinting a potential turnaround in the levels of activity. Nonetheless, the economy is still below the pre-COVID levels as suggested by the recent falling trend in large scale manufacturing.

A further breakdown of the data showed that the trading sector had most companies registered with 414 companies, followed by construction with 294 companies. A total 289 companies were registered in IT sector, 226 in services, 139 in the real estate, 87 companies in food and beverages, 73 incorporate agricultural farming, 70 in eCommerce and 69 companies registered in the tourism sector, according to the SECP.

The SECP data also showed that 63 companies were registered in the education sector, 61 in engineering, 59 in pharmaceutical, 46 in textile, 42 in transport, 38 in marketing and advertisement, 37 in chemical, 28 in logging, 35 in mining and quarrying, 33 in healthcare, 26 companies in each power generation, cables and electric goods, 24 each in fuel and energy, 21 in communications, 19 each in auto and allied and paper/ board, 17 each in broadcasting and telecasting, and cosmetics and toiletries, 14 in steel and allied and 73 companies were registered in other sectors.

The highest numbers of companies – 812 – were registered in Islamabad, followed by 764 and 348 companies in Lahore and Karachi, respectively. The authorities in Peshawar, Multan, Faisalabad, Gilgit-Baltistan, Quetta and Sukkur registered 183, 97, 64, 62, 33 and 2 companies, respectively.

Originally published in The News