The government has launched several development

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It is our responsibility to provide them an enabling environment to stem the emigration.”

initiatives which it hopes will help retain talent, he added.

They include establishing 200,000 paid internships for young engineers, a Rs10 billion ($37.35 million) innovation fund and a Rs40 billion programme to develop 20 poor districts.

Frustrated youth
Almost one in three Pakistanis aged under 30 would like to take a job abroad, found a survey carried out by polling firm Gallup Pakistan and its nonprofit subsidiary the Gilani Foundation last June, before the floods struck.

That rose to above 50% among university-educated youth, said Bilal Gilani, executive director of Gallup Pakistan.

Tahir, the job-seeker in Canada, said his generation were worse buy phone number list off than their parents, who were able to buy real estate, make investments and create wealth in decades past.

“There’s disparity between what salaried people can afford and the income needed to generate savings and wealth, to sustain a family and good lifestyle independently,” he said during a WhatsApp call.

More than a year of double-digit inflation has put a further squeeze on living standards, said one 33-year-old woman, who worked two jobs before leaving for Britain on a one-year student visa four months ago.

“I just cannot afford to live in Pakistan anymore,” she said, asking not to be named.

While in Pakistan, all her living expenses were taken care of by her parents, but increasingly she felt she was a burden on them, and is currently supplementing her savings with a part-time supermarket job in Britain.

“I feel I made a 100% right decision in leaving the toxic cycle I was in,” she added.

Another young worker, a freelance filmmaker, said he had left Pakistan for the Gulf due to frustrations over widespread corruption and payment delays that made it difficult to progress or do business.