‘Pakistan’s foundational learning investments could yield economic returns’

ISLAMABAD: “If Pakistan gets foundational learning right, the economic gains are enormous, not as a one-off boost, but as returns that compound over the working lives of millions of children,” said Tahir Andrabi, Professor of Economics at Pomona College, board member and co-founder of the Centre for Economic Research in Pakistan (CERP), and principal investigator of the LEAPS study.

Dr Andrabi was speaking at a high-level research and policy exchange, From Learning to Earnings: The Long-Term Impacts of Improving Foundational Learning, held at the Pakistan Institute of Education (PIE) in Islamabad. Organised by PIE in collaboration with CERP, the event brought together senior policymakers, researchers and education leaders as part of CERP’s national Learn to Earn campaign.

“Even using conservative estimates from rural Pakistan, where baseline wages are low, foundational learning emerges as one of the highest-return investments a country can make.”

The discussion centred on new findings from the Learning and Educational Achievements in Pakistan Schools (LEAPS) study, one of the country’s most comprehensive education datasets. For the first time, researchers have followed the same children in rural Pakistan for more than 15 years, linking early learning outcomes to schooling attainment and wages in adulthood.

The evidence shows that school quality matters profoundly. Moving a student from the worst school in his village to the best increases completed schooling by 2.06 years. In an average primary school classroom of around 70–75 students, this translates into roughly Rs 85 million (USD302,000) in discounted lifetime wage gains for a single cohort.

Scaled nationally, these gains run into the hundreds of billions of dollars in lifetime earnings, recurring every cohort. A substantial share would return to the state through higher tax revenues, meaning investments in foundational learning pay for themselves over time.

“These estimates imply Pakistan is underinvesting in foundational learning by 30 to 100 times relative to its economic returns,” said Dr Andrabi. It’s becoming increasingly clear that any investment will pay off manifold.”

The research also highlights why systems matter. Households cannot fully substitute for poor teaching quality, even when motivated. Schools can improve, but only when incentives and constraints are addressed. Targeted, system-level investments in pedagogy and accountability can raise learning outcomes while keeping costs under control.

“This is the strongest economic evidence to date linking early learning to long-term outcomes in Pakistan,” said Dr Muhammad Shahid Soroya, Director General of the Pakistan Institute of Education. “It provides policymakers with a clear, actionable case for prioritising foundational learning as a core development strategy.”

Concluding the session, Dr Andrabi said foundational learning is not a social add-on, but the foundation of productivity and growth. “Delaying these investments is a cost Pakistan can no longer afford.”