The Advisor to the Prime Minister on Commerce and Investment, Abdul Razak Dawood, chaired the 3rd meeting of the National e-commerce Council, at the Ministry of Commerce today.

National e-Commerce Council (NeCC) is a body of representatives from the public and private sector and it was constituted in line with the directions of the National e-commerce Policy of Pakistan, approved by the Federal Cabinet on 1st October 2019.

The main objective of the Council is to develop effective collaboration with all relevant sectors for the effective implementation of the e-Commerce Policy.

The first and second meetings of the Council were held under the chairmanship of the Advisor Commerce on 14th January 2020 and 18th June 2020 respectively.

The 3rd meeting of the NeCC was attended by all notified members of the Council from Public and Private sector.

One of the most important happenings of the meeting included the project kick-off between National Institutional Facilitation Technologies (NIFT) and Checkout.com for bringing international payment methods to Pakistan.

The implementation will enable both organizations to provide payment services through each other’s infrastructure and pursue commercial opportunities as a partnership.

This strives towards a borderless experience for business and consumers alike, promoting digital payments and settlements for exports and digital commerce across Pakistan.

Checkout.com is a global payment provider that offers services in more than 150 different currencies, in-country acquiring, robust fraud filters and reporting – all accessed through a single point of integration.

They accept payments from all major international card schemes, including Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Union Pay as well as popular alternative and local payment methods.

Checkout.com brings a unified offering of all the prominent international payment methods and wallets such as PayPal, AliPay, Apple Pay and Google Pay enabling the merchants to pay and run their businesses in Pakistan.

An MoU was also signed between P@SHA and Chain Store Association of Pakistan for working together to promote the use of indigenous technology and connectivity of the SMEs for promoting e-Commerce.