Digital Bangladesh: What it is and what it isn’t

Image: Collected
Technology is the great enabler that helps us reach our goals quicker

What is it that you imagine of when you hear Digital Bangladesh? What is the first thing that will go through your mind?
 
The word “Digital Bangladesh” is now ubiquitous. Ask any housewife in Bhurungamari or students of grade three in Bandarban or a honey collector in the Sundarbans -- they have noticed the term. 

Not only that, it’s likely that they have encountered it when they tried to obtain a service from the federal government in the last few years. In fact, the first visible demonstration of Digital Bangladesh happened when the Honourable Primary Minister Sheikh Hasina introduced 4,500+ Digital Centres countrywide from Char Kukri Mukri this year 2010.

Digital Bangladesh started as a cornerstone of the Bangladesh Awami League’s election manifesto found in 2008, and, as a surprise to most naysayers, has turned into a driving concept inside our country’s socio-economic development, and not merely technologically, going back 12 years.

Digital Bangladesh has also been in the core of the government’s Covid-19 response; come to be it through telemedicine and mobilizing doctors, providing education to an incredible number of school-heading children, or expanding the social back-up and disseminating cash and resources to the needy, such initiatives have already been made possible as a result of Digital Bangladesh. There is no denying that.

 
As we turn to end 2020 still quite definitely battling this global pandemic, 2021, besides hopefully closing this pandemic, is a landmark time for Bangladesh since it marks 50 years of independence following the glorious Liberation War of 1971. Additionally, it is also a 12 months of reckoning and assessment -- to look at if Digital Bangladesh, in tandem with Vision 2021, was successful or failure. 

Even so, to narrow the 12 years of hard work, strategizing, preparing, and implementing countless initiatives and undertakings down to definitives such as for example “success” or “failure” wouldn't normally only be a disservice, nonetheless it would also certainly not be a precise representation of what Digital Bangladesh means. 

Dispelling the myth of Digital Bangladesh

Have the next questions ever registered in your thoughts: What provides Digital Bangladesh designed for me personally? What effect possesses it experienced on my life? Possesses there been any difference in my own life between 2008 and today? Where can be Digital Bangladesh?

You are not alone in the event that you answer “nothing, none, no, nowhere” to the four questions above. However, because you are scanning this article in the Dhaka Tribune, Digital Bangladesh, while certainly highly relevant to you, is not suitable for you. You aren't the target audience. 

Kindly let me explain.

“Digital Bangladesh,” for some, immediately means a futuristic Bangladesh, at the minimum, the one which is internet-enabled. 5G internet. 100% smartphone penetration. 100% high-speed internet penetration. Good homes with good appliances. Artificial intelligence inside our day-to-day lives. Robots undertaking all our tasks. THE WEB of Factors. Some would go out to say “merging of the physical, the digital, and the biological,” repeating after Professor Klaus Schwab of the World Economic Forum.

That is the standard expectation from certain sects of the economy -- dare I state, the “privileged” class.

Make zero mistake about it, we have made tremendous strides in terms of internet penetration over the past 10 years, mostly riding from 2G to 4G, and heading from about 1% penetration to over 60% penetration within the last 12 years, while the price tag on internet access is becoming 1% of what it used to be just before the declaration of Digital Bangladesh. Yes, 1% -- not really a typo!

The ICT industry in Bangladesh has also experienced tremendous growth, with revenue from ICT related work has jumped from $25 million to an impressive $1 billion, with the number only increasing by the year. Our e-commerce sector possesses rapidly expanded, and coupled with mobile financial services and the enormous adoption drive triggered by the pandemic, it is merely going to get bigger. We have even managed to send our very own satellite into space. 

However, what can often be forgotten is that most Bangladesh does not participate in the privileged class. The common reader of the Dhaka Tribune isn't the ordinary Bangladeshi. The common Bangladeshi, in the villages, in the Union Parishads, in the upazilas, isn’t considering AI, or 5G internet, or robots, and is usually frankly not near being ready for them either, become it due to cost, accessibility, or even skill.

Those Bangladeshis are simply trying to create their lives a lttle bit better, are trying to get nearer to the “digital” lives that their richer, more educated, urban counterparts are living. 

In a sense, if Digital Bangladesh began with the urban elite, it could only result in expanding this socio-monetary divide.

Here is the truest essence of Digital Bangladesh, to help those persons bridge the gap that undoubtedly exists between your richer echelons of society and the masses in the united states. 

The “elitist” view of Digital Bangladesh places the give attention to “digital” when, in reality, it was always -- ALWAYS -- about Bangladesh and the Bangladeshi -- Bangabandhu’s “sonar mati” and “sonar manush”.
 
Digital Bangladesh has always been about increasing Bangladesh, about reaching “Sonar Bangla,” of us building a great equitable society with equitable distribution of companies. The digital aspect of it is merely the means to an end, as technology may be the great enabler which allows us to reach our goals quicker.

As such, the primary challenge of Digital Bangladesh was not to enhance the internet, or even to facilitate e-commerce platforms, or to usher in robots and AI. Rather, it was about designing digital alternatives that would support the masses, those without net, those without smartphones, and support bridge that “digital divide” -- one which definitely is present and threatens to widen. 

We must remember that it is ineffective to design a remedy without sincerely being aware of the problem; you must diagnose the problem 1st before devising a remedy. Similarly, we must also remember that development means nothing if it’s not equitable. If the important cities excersice ahead as the rural people -- which continues to be the lion’s talk about of the populace -- remains stagnant, is definitely that even progress?

Trickle-downwards economics doesn’t always work. Thankfully, we didn’t follow the economist Art Laffer when designing Digital Bangladesh. Inspired by Bangabandhu’s philosophy and the honourable primary minister’s vision, we built it from underneath up. The Digital Centre in Char Kukri Mukri is normally a prime exemplory case of that. 

Out of the practically 7,000 Digital Centres in the united states in every union parishads, paurashavas, and city companies, the Union Digital Centres, popularly known as UDCs to the villagers, serve the best number of folks and generate the most earnings for the micro-entrepreneurs who function them.

Keeping that at heart, the national urgent hotline, 333, is among the most notable of types of a digital company that catered to everyone in the united states, not only a select few, to get though smartphone and internet penetration remain fairly low, mobile phone penetration is pretty significant. As for 333’s contribution, the story below highlights precisely how impactful it has been.
Source: https://www.dhakatribune.com

Tags :

Share this news on:

Previous Story

Trending Topics

Archive