Alaul Alam :
It is no denial that in case of accelerating social and economic growth of a country these days there finds no alternatives to promoting digital inclusion. Digital inclusion aims at ensuring all the individuals and communities equal privileges. A nation can see the maximum outcomes of digitalization when its most disadvantaged groups have the access to digital benefits.
It is true that efforts of the countries are ongoing to bring digital inclusion for sustainable economic growth. Despite all these, around half of the world populations are still out of the green line of digitization. In most cases, the poor and the marginalized people hardly see their accessibility to digital benefits. But unless they are ensured digital accessibility, the inclusive benefits of digitalization can never be attained.
It is no denial that over the last three decades the economy of Bangladesh has achieved enormous growth. The GDP growth rate has reached an impressive record level. Per capita income has increased significantly over the years. In many cases apart from battering poverty the country has achieved mostly food security for its 170 million populations. For its shinning economic growth the country has been regarded as an economic powerhouse in South Asia. Along with this, rapid digitization in the country is influencing developmental initiatives to bring positive changes in the society.
The digitization process in Bangladesh has been ongoing which is prioritizing four indicators. These are developing human resources, connecting citizens, providing services to citizens’ doorsteps, and enhancing the ICT-based business opportunities. Obviously, development in any area can be ensured addressing these four key aspects.
In digitizing the country, the government has more emphasized on equipping the manpower with ICT knowledge. A great number of science and technology universities have already been established amid the country to address the gap in technological education. Apart from increasing the number of ICT training centers amid the country.
Of the initiatives, as per the report of 2019, 23000 multimedia classrooms were set up and at the same time 61000 teachers were trained on the ICT with a motto to accelerate ICT based education throughout the country. To equip students with ICT knowledge, a substantial number of teachers have been recruited at secondary and higher secondary education to address the challenges in case of skills development.
Again, we see that along with government technical institutes, private organizations are running many activities to develop skills for people. However, despite all these the question may be pertinent these days that how far we have tackled digital inequality?
Can we deny that in many cases digitalisation is causing digital divide and depriving many to access to the opportunities? The findings of some recent studies have shown that the citizens in Bangladesh are not equally benefitted from digital services. The discrimination in case of getting electronic amenities is not only found between urban and rural areas but also between literate and illiterate people of Bangladesh.
In the same vein as per the report of the World Bank in 2016 it was claimed that ‘digital technologies, too, often fail to empower citizens’. Contrarily, it causes digital divide which creates barriers to employment. Again it escalates social exclusion among low income, rural people and older or disadvantaged groups.
Many claim that amid the huge digital transformation there may be many who are still unaware of getting benefits from digital trend. Despite digital services available even in the remote Union Parishads, majority of the people in the rural areas can not avail their services. Not only that, people who are not sound in technological knowledge have no alternative to bear many challenges in the digital age. In many cases, gaining digital services may be costlier as many have no options but to buy the services from the computer literate people. Studies show that in the age of digitization the digital natives do not face such struggles as the digital immigrants are found to face.
Amid the Covid-19 pandemic digital education introduced for the students of all education levels can be a good example of how digitization process causes digital divide. Though online education was introduced with an aim to ensure inclusive and effective education for students, the findings of many studies revealed that online education trend failed to ensure inclusive outcomes. The poor, disadvantaged and marginalized students found no scopes to avail digital education in the country.
It is true that poor internet connectivity, high rate of internet charge and inaccessibility to technological devices are likely to deepen digital inequality. Certainly, over the last some years the internet coverage in the country has increased. But the report published in 2020 revealed that in case of mobile internet speed Bangladesh was ranked the forth worst country.
To this end, it is time to address the gap in terms of the accessibility to ICT between the socioeconomically privileged and non-privileged. One thing we must bear in mind that only providing the technology is not good enough for a developing country unless widespread initiatives are taken to ensure the adoption of the technology by the end user.
(Alaul Alam teaches at Prime University. He is also a research
scholar at the IBS).
