Pakistan has urged stronger global cooperation on digital assets, calling for regulatory and institutional frameworks that support innovation and protect consumers. It warned that countries must shape the future of finance or risk others shaping it for them.
Minister of State Bilal Bin Saqib delivered the message virtually at the United Nations Headquarters. He also chairs the Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA).
The session carried the title “Digital Assets and Blockchain for Sustainable Development: Advancing Digital Finance through Innovation.”
Pakistan’s Permanent Mission to the UN convened it with UNDP, UNCTAD and the Office of the Secretary-General’s Envoy on Technology (ODET). Member states, UN entities and private-sector stakeholders attended.
“The question before this room is not whether these technologies will scale. They will. The question is: who will shape them, and in whose interest,” he said.
Financial inclusion and remittance costs
Bin Saqib said digital assets, tokenisation and distributed ledger technologies could help emerging economies redesign financial infrastructure around inclusion, efficiency and access.
He cited around 1.4 billion adults outside the formal financial system. Billions more, he said, face expensive remittances, slow settlements and limited credit.
Sending $200 across borders still costs more than twice the 3% target under Sustainable Development Goal 10.c, he noted. Closing that gap could return billions of dollars annually to families.
The World Bank’s Remittance Prices Worldwide website reports an average global transfer cost of 6.36%, supporting that comparison. At that rate, sending $200 costs about $12.72, compared with $6 at 3%. (World Bank)
Opportunities beyond payments
Bin Saqib said digital identity and verifiable financial histories could help small businesses, farmers and women entrepreneurs demonstrate economic activity. These tools could reduce reliance on conventional collateral or documentation.
Tokenisation could mobilise capital by dividing assets into smaller investment units, including infrastructure bonds and renewable energy projects. Distributed ledger technology could also improve transparency in public spending and supply chains.
However, he cautioned that technology alone would not solve development challenges.
He identified retail market volatility, illicit finance and concentrated economic power among the risks. He also warned of a widening regulatory divide between technologically advanced countries and those lacking institutional capacity.
Regulation must keep pace
“The choice before every Member State is not regulate or don’t regulate. It is simpler, and starker, than that: to govern the future, or be governed by it,” he said.
Bin Saqib argued that regulation must evolve alongside innovation. Delays could expose consumers and markets to harm. Rules driven mainly by fear could push digital activity into less transparent environments.
Emerging international experience, he said, showed that regulation could help build markets rather than block their development.
“No nation rises alone, and no nation should be left to rise alone,” Bin Saqib said, urging deeper international cooperation.
He called on member states to make the UN briefing a starting point for that effort.
