Digitalizing rural Bangladesh
Monday, 22 December 2008
Shamsul Huq Zahid
Rural Bangladesh has not changed much in the past decades as far as technological development is concerned. New roads and bridges have been constructed. Schools and colleges have come up in substantial numbers. The only modern gadgets that have reached the village homes are television and mobile phones. But most villagers do not even have electricity in their homes. They are dependent on kerosene-fed lamps which also cannot be afforded for a long time by the rural poor.
Educational institutions do not have adequate number of teachers and other physical facilities. Elementary knowledge about computer technology is imparted to students of secondary level classes, but most of the schools do not have computers. Upazilla (sub-district) headquarters have a few telephone lines but getting dial tones still remains a challenge.
Healthcare facilities are inadequate with doctors employed by the government to serve the villagers prefer to remain absent from their workplaces most of the time. Villages are dependent on agriculture for their sustenance. But floods, cyclones and droughts are recurrent events that cause enormous sufferings to the farming community. There were lots of talk about flood control and so-called flood actions plans were prepared at a substantial cost between the late eighties and the early nineties. But not a word has been heard from any quarters since then. All the funds spent on the preparation of the plans have gone down the drain and the people are still exposed to the vagaries of nature.
So, the majority of the villagers are still poor though there could be some variations in percentage estimates. The per capita income of a sizeable number of the rural population is well below the national average. In fact there exists two Bangladesh. The urban Bangladesh is looking ahead with promises of a better future and the rural one is still stuck in the past except for a few cosmetic changes. Government leaders, development planners and non-governmental organizations do very often talk about transforming the rural Bangladesh into a powerhouse of economic growth. But the reality is that their pious wishes are still confined to plans and projects. Nobody knows for sure when actually the much desired process of transformation would begin.
Priority-wise, rural people need food, safe drinking water, education, electricity etc. But technology has the potential to transform their life and expose them to new worlds. So far the governments have tried a lot of programmes, in most cases, in line with the wishes of the multilateral donor agencies, to help the rural people generate more income and, thus, improve their living conditions. The end results have not been that impressive.
Lately, poverty alleviation are the two most frequently used words by the donors, policy makers and development planners both at national and international levels. Information technology that has brought about a sea change in the life and living conditions across the globe, if made available at the doorsteps of the rural population, is unlikely to make a noticeable change overnight. But it would surely help trigger gradual transformation of rural Bangladesh.
A private information technology firm-Bangladesh Telecentre Network, BTN,- which is devoted to the task of reaching the fruits of ICT to villages, launched, what it named, 'Mission 2011' sometime back to set up 40,000 telecentres or information kiosks all over Bangladesh by 2011. The theme of the mission is 'building a sustainable ICT-based information and knowledge system for the poor and marginalized'. A telecentre or an information kiosk is a public place where people have access to computers, internets and other technologies. Such centres, in addition to helping overcome isolation, could ensure a lot of economic benefit to the rural population. By availing the internet services, farmers would be able to know the commodity prices in distant urban markets and the youths would get employment information. The government also would be able to circulate necessary information to the people at grassroots easily. Neighbouring India earns billions of dollars a year from IT exports has engaged itself in reaching the benefit of the technology to rural areas. Thousands of information kiosks have been set up in Indian villages.
The cell phone has brought about a revolutionary change in our life, rural or urban. The availability of internet services at the door steps of the rural people through telecentres or kiosks would take that revolution one step forward. The BTN or any other organization engaged in the task of widening the use of ICT should try to penetrate deep into rural Bangladesh and must not concentrate on urban or semi-urban spots for the sake of higher profit earning.
However, it would be really hard for a private organization to accomplish such a difficult task alone. The local government institutions at the grassroots, particularly at the union level, can be very helpful in reaching the goals of digitalizing the rural Bangladesh. The BTN and others willing to engage in this mission should better devise joint ventures with the union parishads to help establish kiosks in rural areas.
Rural Bangladesh has not changed much in the past decades as far as technological development is concerned. New roads and bridges have been constructed. Schools and colleges have come up in substantial numbers. The only modern gadgets that have reached the village homes are television and mobile phones. But most villagers do not even have electricity in their homes. They are dependent on kerosene-fed lamps which also cannot be afforded for a long time by the rural poor.
Educational institutions do not have adequate number of teachers and other physical facilities. Elementary knowledge about computer technology is imparted to students of secondary level classes, but most of the schools do not have computers. Upazilla (sub-district) headquarters have a few telephone lines but getting dial tones still remains a challenge.
Healthcare facilities are inadequate with doctors employed by the government to serve the villagers prefer to remain absent from their workplaces most of the time. Villages are dependent on agriculture for their sustenance. But floods, cyclones and droughts are recurrent events that cause enormous sufferings to the farming community. There were lots of talk about flood control and so-called flood actions plans were prepared at a substantial cost between the late eighties and the early nineties. But not a word has been heard from any quarters since then. All the funds spent on the preparation of the plans have gone down the drain and the people are still exposed to the vagaries of nature.
So, the majority of the villagers are still poor though there could be some variations in percentage estimates. The per capita income of a sizeable number of the rural population is well below the national average. In fact there exists two Bangladesh. The urban Bangladesh is looking ahead with promises of a better future and the rural one is still stuck in the past except for a few cosmetic changes. Government leaders, development planners and non-governmental organizations do very often talk about transforming the rural Bangladesh into a powerhouse of economic growth. But the reality is that their pious wishes are still confined to plans and projects. Nobody knows for sure when actually the much desired process of transformation would begin.
Priority-wise, rural people need food, safe drinking water, education, electricity etc. But technology has the potential to transform their life and expose them to new worlds. So far the governments have tried a lot of programmes, in most cases, in line with the wishes of the multilateral donor agencies, to help the rural people generate more income and, thus, improve their living conditions. The end results have not been that impressive.
Lately, poverty alleviation are the two most frequently used words by the donors, policy makers and development planners both at national and international levels. Information technology that has brought about a sea change in the life and living conditions across the globe, if made available at the doorsteps of the rural population, is unlikely to make a noticeable change overnight. But it would surely help trigger gradual transformation of rural Bangladesh.
A private information technology firm-Bangladesh Telecentre Network, BTN,- which is devoted to the task of reaching the fruits of ICT to villages, launched, what it named, 'Mission 2011' sometime back to set up 40,000 telecentres or information kiosks all over Bangladesh by 2011. The theme of the mission is 'building a sustainable ICT-based information and knowledge system for the poor and marginalized'. A telecentre or an information kiosk is a public place where people have access to computers, internets and other technologies. Such centres, in addition to helping overcome isolation, could ensure a lot of economic benefit to the rural population. By availing the internet services, farmers would be able to know the commodity prices in distant urban markets and the youths would get employment information. The government also would be able to circulate necessary information to the people at grassroots easily. Neighbouring India earns billions of dollars a year from IT exports has engaged itself in reaching the benefit of the technology to rural areas. Thousands of information kiosks have been set up in Indian villages.
The cell phone has brought about a revolutionary change in our life, rural or urban. The availability of internet services at the door steps of the rural people through telecentres or kiosks would take that revolution one step forward. The BTN or any other organization engaged in the task of widening the use of ICT should try to penetrate deep into rural Bangladesh and must not concentrate on urban or semi-urban spots for the sake of higher profit earning.
However, it would be really hard for a private organization to accomplish such a difficult task alone. The local government institutions at the grassroots, particularly at the union level, can be very helpful in reaching the goals of digitalizing the rural Bangladesh. The BTN and others willing to engage in this mission should better devise joint ventures with the union parishads to help establish kiosks in rural areas.