The annual computer show organised by the Bangladesh Computer Samity (BCS) was held recently in Dhaka. It has been a regular feature in recent years. But the
shows are yet to provide substantial evidence that the country is well on its way to realising its potential in the vital information communications technology (ICT) sector.
However, it is probably still not too late to catch up with projection earlier made that Bangladesh could earn at least $2 billion annually from this sector by the year 2006.
Recently, it was reported that a company in Bangladesh could successfully produce the entire software requirements of a large chain store in the USA. This news is inspirational but does not signify a breakthrough in IT exports. It
indicates, however, that the country has acquired some capacities to take on IT products exports.
The crucial requirement is comparative advantage or competitiveness for the export orders to increase rapidly.
The wages or salaries of ICT workers in Bangladesh are substantially lower compared to India, China and other countries and likely to remain that way in the near future.
But to exploit this advantage into real competitiveness, Bangladesh requires quickly better connectivity to the international information superhighway. Presently, the links to that highway through satellite is proving to be hopelessly outdated. Data entry operations can be very lucrative for Bangladesh. Bangladesh with its huge number of educated but unemployed youth could have carved out a niche in the worldwide data entry business by now. But at the
moment it remains uncompetitive in this field as it lacks connectivity to the international fibre optic backbone that alone can ensure the desired speed of two-way data communication required by data entry customers abroad. Therefore, all constraints in the way of the establishment of this vital fibre optic connection need to be removed at the fastest.
Software making for the overseas market is the other very lucrative opportunity awaiting Bangladesh. The government to this end should encourage widespread use of software, locally, both to get the benefit of ICT for the domestic economy and to help the process of adding to the pool of skilled software makers. Therefore, as the major stepping stone to exporting software at the desired level for the foreign markets, software making and their applications internally will have to be energetically promoted as part of a short term strategy.
Giving a boost to software production also calls for much improving the quality of ICT education. The capacities for such education at public institutions will have to be much increased and improved. In the realm of private sector ICT
education, government must lay down guidelines and monitor or enforce their compliance. Private ICT education centres ought to provide specialised courses that are being used by dotcom companies around the world. But only a handful of
ICT education centres are providing such courses in Bangladesh.
The long term strategy for the sound development of the ICT sector calls for introduction of an appropriate education policy and its implementation from elementary to secondary and higher levels so that this policy can pay off by
facilitating the creation of an able and big enough workforce for the ICT sector in the long run. Knowledge of English, Science and Mathematics is basic to success in ICT. The teaching of these subjects at all stages in Bangladesh will have to be much improved.
Besides, non-resident Bangladeshis (NRBs) should be encouraged with attractive incentives to set up software producing enterprises in Bangladesh. The ICT village plan also requires immediate implementation to boost export of ICT products.
Development planning, business decisions and social sector programmes cannot be conceived in the first place without the requisite data available to the planners. For instance, a business organisation, while spending on product
development or introduction of a new product or service, requires reliable data as regards the number of potential consumers, their purchasing power, tastes, preferences, existing market shares of other competitors, etc.
If its data compilation and projections are accurate and it takes its business decision based on such accurate data, then commercial success of that organisation or its product or service can be expected. Another example of the
instance of statistics can be, say, a population control programme of the government. If the statistical exercise in this field such as field survey with samples are flawed in any respect, then the programme would surely suffer from
inadequately targeting family planning recipients or not reaching the target population.
In the sphere of developmental planning, short, medium and long termn projections in various fields are indispensable for the planners based on which they formulate their plans. Here again, statistical inaccuracy can be fatal leading to poor planning, waste or wrong channelling of resources.
Steps are needed to improve the efficacy of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) which is the main official statistics generating body. According to reports, it needs revamping to improve its operational effectiveness. Besides, it must be looked into whether the BSS, as a rule, is employing the latest and most reliable statistical methods to ensure the dependability of data.
Most data are generated on the basis of field surveys or equivalents that in turn are based on samples of population groups. The formation of the samples are considered as extremely important that determine the accuracy or otherwise of the data. In many areas, it is thought that BBS follows outdated techniques or sampling methods that increase the probabilities of error in its data collection and very accurate projections or conclusions cannot be drawn with such data.
Therefore, it is imperative to improve the functioning of BBS. But apart from BBS, there are other departments and organisations of the government that also produce plenty of data on their own. These bodies should also be brought under
similar improvement processes to make their data reliable or accurate.
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