Data & Editorial Disclaimer

Effective date: August 19, 2026 Last updated: August 19, 2026

This page explains, in plain language, how SourceGrowth builds the data and research it publishes, what our terminology means, and the limits of what we can promise. Read this alongside our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

How our data is built — two different kinds of information

SourceGrowth publishes two categories of information, and it matters which one you're looking at:

1. Public-data indexes. Some of what we publish — for example, wage and rate indexes — is built from public sources: job postings, public salary listings, and similar publicly available data, collected and normalized by our team (including AI-assisted extraction and translation where source material is in a local language). This data is labeled as an index or public-data build wherever it appears, with the source mix, sample size, and collection date stated on the page.

2. Ground-truth data. Separately, our in-country team physically visits providers and factories, and periodically solicits real quotes, to produce dated, on-the-ground observations. This is the "verified" layer described below, and it is held to a stricter standard than the public-data indexes.

We do not blend these two categories without saying so. A page built from public data says so; a page or data point backed by our own physical verification says so. If a page combines both, it labels which parts are which.

The wage-versus-billed-rate distinction

This is the single most important methodology note on the Site: wages are not the same number as what a buyer is billed.

• Wages are what we observe workers being paid, sourced from job postings and public salary data, dated to the collection period.
• Billed/outsourcing rates — what a US or international buyer might actually pay a vendor or staffing provider — are typically higher than the underlying wage, because a markup is added by the vendor, agency, or intermediary for overhead, margin, and service.

Where we publish an estimated billed rate, it is explicitly modeled: we state the observed wage figure, the markup range we applied, and a link to our methodology. A modeled rate is an estimate, not a quote. We never present a modeled billed rate as if it were an observed, guaranteed, or negotiated price. Any specific price you are offered by a provider is between you and that provider.

What "verified" means on this site — and what it doesn't

We use the word "verified" narrowly and consistently:

"Verified" means our team physically visited the location and confirmed the stated facts in person, on a specific dated visit. A "verified" record always carries a last_verified date. If we did not physically visit and confirm something ourselves, we do not call it "verified" — at most we call it "reported," meaning it comes from a source other than our own on-site confirmation (a public listing, a claim by the provider itself, etc.), and we say so.

Important: as of this disclaimer's effective date, nothing published on SourceGrowth carries the "verified" label, because our on-site verification program has not yet produced dated visit records to publish. Until it does, any provider, factory, or fact described on the Site should be read as "reported" or "sourced from public data," not "verified," regardless of how confident the description sounds. This page will be updated, and the site's language will change accordingly, the moment verified records actually exist — not before.

We do not use "verified," "vetted," "certified," "independently verified," or similar language as a synonym for "listed" or "included." Being mentioned on SourceGrowth is never, by itself, a claim that we have confirmed anything about a provider.

We refer out for audits and inspections — we don't perform them

SourceGrowth's own site visits are not a substitute for a formal factory audit, compliance inspection, quality-control check, or financial diligence. We are not an auditing body, and a mention or physical visit by our team does not carry the weight of a licensed audit (such as those performed by firms like SGS, QIMA, V-Trust, or similar independent auditors). If you need a formal audit, inspection, or compliance certification before committing to a transaction, engage a licensed third-party auditor directly — we can point you toward that category of service, but we do not perform it ourselves and do not claim to.

Not affiliated with any government body

SourceGrowth is an independent, privately operated research publication. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, sponsored by, or acting on behalf of any government agency, trade body, embassy, or official trade-promotion organization, in Pakistan, the United States, or any other country. Where we cite government or public-agency data (for example, tariff circulars or official statistics), we link to the original source; the citation does not imply a relationship with that body.

Accuracy limits

We aim for accuracy and we date everything, but:

• Corridor conditions change, sometimes faster than our publishing cadence.
• Public-source data (job postings, public listings) may itself be inaccurate, outdated, or unrepresentative — we report what we observed in the source, not a guarantee that the source itself was correct.
• Small sample sizes are labeled as such ("insufficient data" where a data cell has too few observations to publish responsibly), and we do not smooth over thin samples to make a page look more complete.
• Currency conversions are stated with the exchange rate and date used.

Corrections

If you believe something we've published is inaccurate, outdated, or should be corrected — including a provider's status, a data figure, or an attribution — reach us via the contact form at sourcegrowth.com/contact with the specific page and what you believe is wrong. We review correction requests and will update or annotate the record where warranted.