There are around nine million Pakistanis who have left their homeland in search of employment and each month they send money home – as much as $1.9 billion in total every 30 days.
Around 82 percent of money that is sent back to Pakistan comes from just five countries – Saudi Arabia, the United States, the United Kingdom. Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates.
One of Careem’s biggest markets is Pakistan, but many of the Careem Captains working in other countries – notable here in the UAE – are also Pakistani. So, we invited 50 Pakistani Captains working in Dubai to meet with Mudassir Sheikha, CEO and Co-Founder of Careem, and Zulfiqar Bukhari, the Special Assistant of the Prime Minister for Overseas Pakistan.
To mark this meeting, Junaid Iqbal, the Managing Director of Careem Pakistan is now working with the Ministry of Overseas to develop special promo codes for expat Pakistanis to use when they are back in Pakistan. In addition to this, a team is now being set up to work with various governments in Gulf countries to increase the number of Pakistani expats.
Mudassir Sheikha, CEO, and co-founder of Careem said, “We were honoured to host Zulfiqar Bukhari, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister for Overseas Pakistanis at our HQ in Dubai. It gave us a valuable opportunity to discuss ways in which we can improve the lives of Pakistani Captains in the UAE and across the Gulf region.”
He added: “We believe that it’s the hard work and dedication of these men and women that have helped us succeed as an organization. We hope to drive more initiatives such as this across the region, to emphasise that the wellbeing of our Captains is a top priority for Careem.”
Zulfiqar Bukhari, said, “The government tremendously values the contribution of overseas Pakistanis to the economy of Pakistan, and will take every measure to ease out their living outside of Pakistan, from the perspective of financial inclusion and investment back home”.