Technology transfer spurs economic development

M Jalal Hussain Innovation and technology play the most significant role in the lives of billions of people in the present-day world. The decent and luxurious life-styles of the people of the 21st century spring directly from the proliferation of science, technology and innovation. The more a country is developed in science and technology the more it is developed economically, financially and socially. It is a fact that the higher the level of investment in innovation, technology, research and development in an economy, the higher will be the rate of economic growth. In the last three decades, many countries around the world have remarkably advanced their economies by investing in innovations and technology. The year 2011 marked the 50th anniversary of the introduction of technology transfer debate at the multilateral level. Technology transfer was first tabled as an international issue in 1961 as part of a request to the United Nations Secretary General by some developing countries to commission studies to ascertain the role played by international treaties in promoting the protection of intellectual property rights in developing countries. Bangladesh is far off from economic development through transfer of technology and innovation in the private and public sectors. Bangladesh, a scarce-resource, oil-poor and densely populated country with a small area of land within its boundary, has no option other than going for science, technology and innovations to attain economic development and sustainable growth. Transfer is a tool for any country to acquire technology and innovation. Bangladesh has the Science and Technology Policy, 1986 with the provisions for development of indigenous technology and attainment of a national capacity for selection, assessment, adoption, acquisition and adaptation of technology and innovations from the developed countries. Due to lack of implementation strategy, main elements of the declared Policy like technology and innovation transfer could not be implemented in various sectors of the economy. Bangladesh has natural gas reserves scattered in different areas of the country. State-owned gas companies are engaged in selling and distribution of gas to customers inside the country. State-owned autonomous body (corporation) Petrobangla controls and supervises gas distribution companies. Natural gas is in use in the country for the last 30 years for industrial, commercial and domestic consumption. Thirty years is a pretty good time to transfer of technology relating to gas exploration, distribution, drilling and maintenance by any country in the present world. But regrettably the transfer of technology didn't take place and changed hands in this country. The distribution of gas and maintenance, exploration and drillings are still done by foreign companies on the basis of production-revenue-share contracts. Resultantly, the lion share of the revenue from sale of gas to customers goes to the pockets of the foreign companies. The overpopulated country with poor per capita income is deprived of gas, the gift of Nature, to a great extent due to lack of technology and innovation transfer on time. The question comes to the minds of the common people, economists and analysts: who is responsible for the failure in technology transfer the state or the policy-makers? The professionals like engineers or bureaucrats? Whoever is responsible, the national economy is getting the severe backlash of the failure of technology transfer by way of losing a huge amount of revenue earned from gas sale and distribution. The Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission, a state-owned organisation, runs with the tax-payers' money. But the people of the country didn't see any nuclear project run by this organisation like nuclear power plant for generating energy or making uranium water. After 40 years, the country has to enter an agreement with Russia on nuclear power plant for generating nuclear energy for the energy-starved country at the time when the developed countries are thinking and planning to switch over from nuclear energy to renewable energy. It's a great regret that an organisation established exclusively for research and development of nuclear technology, failed to gather nuclear technology with 40 years' span of time although a huge amount of public fund has been used for research, development and technology transfer. The Bangladesh Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (Science Laboratory) is another well-established state-owned organisation, equipped with many scientific, senior scientific and principal scientific officers, to carry on research and development and technology transfer jobs. But we, the common people, don't see any of its contributions in technology transfer and innovations for the technology-starved nation. But the organisation is operating since independence of the country at tax payers' money. In the field of textile and ready-made garment (RMG) industries, Bangladesh has been doing better and has been progressing well. Bangladeshi and foreign industrialists have started operating in these sectors for the last 30 to 35 years. Thirty years are a long time to attain, develop and use the latest technology and innovations in various industries and businesses. But technology transfer has not taken place adequately and as a result, the textile and RMG industries have to rely on expatriate technicians, mechanics and professionals and the economy is losing huge hard-earned foreign currency by way of remittances from the expatriate workers. The flawed technology transfer policy, substandard industrial policy and lack of appropriate laws to ensure technology transfer are responsible for the failure of technology transfer. Manufacturing or assembling air-conditioners, refrigerators and TV sets has become a simple technology now-a-days and some Asian and Middle Eastern countries are successfully doing the jobs. Bangladesh is still far behind in this area and has been importing these items from Thailand, Malaysia and Taiwan for the last few decades because it has miserably failed to acquire the technology and apply it in manufacturing or assembling. Technology transfer did not happen in the country due to many factors. Other countries like Korea are the home to Samsung, LG, Hyundai, and other notable technology-driven firms. Phillips, the major European consumer electronics firm, could enter the flat panel TV market only through a joint venture with LG. Taiwan is the base for Acer, which recently acquired Gateway, a major US computer company. Four decades ago, Samsung, LG, and Hyundai were small firms. Acer, Logitech, and other large Taiwanese high-tech firms did not exist. Newer industrialising nations such as China and India are also improving their technological base. China is home to Lenovo, the largest laptop manufacturer in Asia, which now owns IBM's former laptop division, and India possesses a thriving software industry. Bangladesh is hackneyed in electronics, mobile, ICT and other high-value-added industries due to absence of technology and innovations application. Countries need not employ all of the potential areas of new technology, but they need to utilise at least some. During the 1950s, Japan relied heavily on technology licensing while discouraging FDI. In the 1960s and 1970s, Korea also largely excluded FDI but used technology licensing, consultants, and imported equipment and intermediates as sources of technological advances. Countries such as Malaysia and Thailand pursued several paths simultaneously. The orientation in the Asian countries was openness to foreign ideas, some embodied in physical inputs, others conveyed by manuals, blueprints, and know-how. Egypt was the advanced country in the Middle East in terms of education, culture and low-tech industries in 1960. But after 50 years that country could not be developed industrially and technologically as it failed to transfer technology and innovation and its exports are mainly simple textiles and clothing. In most of the industrially and scientifically developed countries, the universities have research and development department to carry out research work on the latest technologies. Two significant components of technology and innovation processes are: knowledge and successful diffusion of that knowledge resulting in new products or services offered to customers. The universities offer the new technology they invent to the private and public sector industries for implementation. Bangladesh has many universities but we don't find any such activity or any new product they offer to the private or public industries. The defective education policy and improper implementation are responsible for failure on the part of the universities to come up with new technology and innovations. Economists and analysts made comprehensive research and studies on the subject of technology transfer in Bangladesh. They have identified the constraints that have stymied technology transfer and the myriad causes for the failure of technology and innovation transfer. During the last few decades, there has been no shortage of project proposals and policy studies for development and implementation of science, technology and innovations in the country. In most of the cases, there have been sheer declarations of intention with little or no operational value. Proposed plans were neither implemented nor followed up in many cases. Dearth of professionals, skilled technicians and skilled workers are stumbling blocks on the way of technology and innovation transfer. The country has plenty of unskilled workers due to poor literacy rate and the general education system is directed to liberal arts instead of science and technical subjects in schools, colleges and universities. Shortage of competent manpower is identified as the major limitation in R&D institutions in Bangladesh. The 'brain-drain' phenomenon of recent times, attraction for overseas jobs and lack of proper service conditions in the R&D institutes, have all contributed to the shortage of competent scientists, engineers, other professionals and skilled technicians. However laws, acts or ordinances specifically dealing with technological development have not been adequately promulgated in the country to accelerate technology transfer. Bituminous and non-cooking coal has been found in three places in the northern zone of the country near Jamalganj (Bogra), Boropukuria (Bogra), Boropukuria (Dinajpur) and Pirganj (Rangpur). All three deposits are reported to be quite substantial. The exploitation of this resource for power generation has begun. Hard rocks at mineable depths have been found in the northern zone. Plans for their exploitation have been finalised. Glass quality sand deposits have been found at a few locations along the northern and eastern borders where alluvial plains meet the hilly terrains. Due to absence of technology to extract coal and other minerals, the country has to rely on foreign technicians and technology and project implementation is always delayed and become costly. In-depth studies on the issue of transfer of technology in various industrial sectors of Bangladesh reflect one thing in common: meagre capabilities to magnetise imported technology. From technology transfer, case studies of chemical and fertiliser industries, leather industries, general electrical goods manufacturing, the Bangladesh diesel plant and engineering industries, it is witnessed that there are frailties in both planning and implementation stages. These severely affect technology transfer processes both in public and private sector industries. In private sector industries, most of the industries don't have research and development department to chalk out plans for transfer of technology since there is no legal bindings as per law of the land. It is noticeable that some big manufacturing industries have been keeping expatriate technicians for ten to 15 years and they don't have any plan to replace them with local technicians. With the existing system, it is very easy to get expatriate technicians after observing the formalities with the Board of Investment (BoI) and other concerned authorities. The BoI can play an important role by fixing a time frame for replacing the expatriate technicians while giving the work permits. In this process, the country's economy loses huge foreign exchange on one hand and in other way technology transfer doesn't happen. In 1960, some East Asian countries was at par with some South Asian and Middle Eastern countries. With the transfer of technology and innovations, the East Asian countries have enormously developed their economies by increasing GDP per capita income from US$ 1,500 to US$ 35,000 whereas the Middle Eastern (oil-poor) countries and South Asian countries failed to transfer technology and innovation and remained backward in science, technology and innovations. They could not develop at par with the technologically resourceful East Asian countries. Bangladesh is one of the South Asian countries lagging far behind in economic development in comparison with the East Asian countries. The GDP per capita income Bangladesh was $81 in 1960 and currently it is $1,170. Bangladesh achieved unsatisfactory and pitiable economic development since 1972 due to failure of acquiring science, technology and innovations and its application in public and private industries and businesses. Understanding of the mechanism of economic development has shifted over time. Simon Kuznets, a Nobel laureate, said the rapid economic growth in developed nations stemmed from the systematic application of science and technology in the production process. The policy-makers, economists and the business communities of Bangladesh should accelerate the process of technology transfer and innovations. Bangladesh lags far behind the emerging economies in reaping benefits from technology transfer. There is still no attempt to arm our scientists and technicians with modern technological skills without which the economy cannot be expected to move forward. [email protected]