In a major development, Pakistan’s Punjab provincial government announced this month that foreign universities from the United Kingdom, Kazakhstan, and South Korea will establish branch campuses in the province, The Caspian Post informs via Univercity World News.
The announcement resulted from a major policy meeting on 24 July, chaired by Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz Sharif, who welcomed the expressions of interest from the foreign universities in establishing branch campuses in the province and directed relevant authorities to complete the required procedure.
Four UK universities - University of London, Brunel University, University of Gloucestershire and University of Leicester - one university from Kazakhstan, and an as yet unnamed Korean university have agreed to open full branch campuses in the province. In addition, the South Korean government will establish a free language centre in Punjab to foster linguistic and cultural exchange.
The campuses are to be located in Knowledge City, Lahore, where the government has reportedly allocated land and will soon issue standard operating procedures (SOPs) to facilitate their establishment and functioning.
Kazakhstan’s Minister of Science and Higher Education Sayasat Nurbek told University World News this week: “We are preparing to open the very first branch campus of a Kazakh university in Pakistan,” adding it would be the first Kazakh university to operate outside Central Asia.
“When negotiating with the Higher Education Commission, they said they want a medical university or engineering. So, it is most likely to be Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, our largest public university,” he said.
The branch campus would begin operating next year but was most likely to be in Islamabad, Nurbek noted.
Kazakhstan currently hosts almost 1,200 students from Pakistan, the fourth largest group of foreign students there after students from India, Russia and China.
The Kazakh ministry said Pakistan was a focus country for the Study in Kazakhstan Project, with bilateral meetings held this year with representatives of Pakistani higher education institutions, agencies and government bodies.
“There is a lot of interest from Pakistani students to come to Kazakhstan, but some of them cannot come because of our visa regulations, and so they [Pakistan] said if you cannot let in so many students from Pakistan [why not] open your branch campus here,” Nurbek said.
South Korea has around 1,600 students from Pakistan at its universities and is seeking to expand foreign student numbers due to a declining youth population.
In June a delegation from South Korea’s Tongwon University announced plans to establish six Korean language learning centres in Pakistan in collaboration with the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training.
These centres aim to enhance language proficiency and improve the overseas employment prospects of Pakistani students, particularly in technologically advanced sectors like automation, smart manufacturing, electronics, and renewable energy.
Ambitious reform agenda
“This initiative, if materialised, will help our students receive foreign-quality higher education without going abroad. This will save huge expenses associated with overseas study and slow down the brain drain, as many students who go abroad for foreign education prefer to work there,” Professor Muhammad Ali, vice-chancellor of Lahore’s University of the Punjab, told University World News.
The entry of reputed foreign institutions is also expected to push local universities to raise their academic standards, improve faculty quality, and enhance research standards, he said.
Senior education officials and policy analysts in Pakistan said foreign branch campuses act as a bridge between local and global academia, introducing international standards, innovative teaching approaches, and globally recognised degrees. They believe such opportunities at home would ease financial and logistical burdens for students who might otherwise have to pursue education overseas.
It is part of an ambitious higher education reform agenda being rolled out by the Punjab government. The Punjab Higher Education Strategic Plan 2025-2029, a five-year roadmap produced by the Punjab Higher Education Commission (PHEC), also envisions turning a number of local public sector universities into globally competitive institutions through stronger governance, greater institutional independence, expanded research capacity, and academic modernisation.
“The establishment of foreign university campuses is a major initiative to serve as [a] core component of [the] province’s higher education transformation strategy. Through this initiative, Punjab seeks to enhance its standing as a leading regional centre for high-quality tertiary education,” Provincial Minister for School Education and Higher Education Rana Sikandar Hayat told University World News.
Any foreign university planning to operate in Pakistan must comply with the established higher education regulatory framework, primarily overseen by the federal Higher Education Commission (HEC) and the Provincial Higher Education Commission (PHEC) under the Transnational Education (TNE) Policy of 2024.
According to this policy, any “Foreign Higher Education Institution (HEI) planning to operate in Pakistan (through their offshore campus) would be required to secure approval of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Interior, and respective Provincial Governments and apply to HEC for No objection Certificate (NOC)”.
Past initiatives
In the past, several similar initiatives to bring foreign universities to Pakistan were announced with considerable enthusiasm but failed to fully materialise.
Memoranda of understanding were often signed, and ambitious plans were shared publicly, yet many projects stalled at the implementation stage due to regulatory delays, funding constraints, shifting political priorities, or inadequate follow-through from partnering institutions.
Iqrar Ahmad Khan, chairperson of the PHEC, told University World News: “Because many past projects didn’t move beyond announcements, the government is now being more careful and wants to make sure that this time all hurdles are removed so that these plans [for establishing foreign campuses] actually turn into realty.”
A prominent example of foreign academic collaboration in Pakistan is the Pak-Austria Fachhochschule: Institute of Applied Sciences and Technology in Haripur (Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province). Developed through partnerships with Austrian and Chinese institutions, this initiative is considered a successful example of how international alliances can help build specialised, industry-focused universities in the country.
A similar vision was pursued in Lahore, where the Knowledge Park project sought to attract international institutions through formal agreements. In 2014, memoranda of understanding were signed with several foreign universities - including the UK’s Lancaster University.
However, some academics are cautious and emphasise that the initiative needs to be based on strong foundations. Vice-chancellor of Islamabad’s Quaid-e-Azam University, Professor Niaz Ahmad Akhtar, told University World News, “Bringing foreign universities to Pakistan is a good step, but it must rest on a strong and clear foundation.”
He said such institutions should be properly facilitated through smooth procedures and transparent policies so that the initiative can actually succeed.
University World News Asia Editor Yojana Sharma contributed to this article.
