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ICT seeks to be on the front burner

Md Hasan
Information and communication technology (ICT) stakeholders have demanded a 5 percent share of the Tk 30,500 crore annual development programme in the upcoming 2009-10 budget, argu ing that such an initial allotment is a must to implement the government's pledge to create a Digital Bangladesh.
Of the proposed allocation, ICT leaders recom mended that a 50 percent chunk should be ear marked for software and IT-enabled services.
The fiscal 2008 09 budget allocated Tk 150 crore for the science and ICT ministry.
In a proposal, the Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS) said 2 percent of the revenue budget should be allocated for operations and maintenance of ICT-based citizen service delivery systems so that ordinary people can benefit from the technology.
In addition to insisting on a Tk 1,525 crore bud getary allocation, the ICT leaders urged the govern ment to value local company inventions by awarding them to local public and private organisations.
The ICT sector is expected to receive extra care and attention in the upcoming budget, as the government is committed to create a Digital Bangladesh by 2021.
However, a lack of ICT infrastructure and delayed policy execution could prove to be a challenge in realising the goal, observed ICT industry people.
"Besides a monetary allocation, the government should ensure the use of inventions made by local companies in public and private institutes. The domestic market could be the base for the local com -parties and the sector can then go for ventures overseas." said Habibullah N Kanm, president of BASIS
He explained that if local companies get a chance to work in the domestic market first, the experience would then help them to bag businesses in the global market.
Echoing the BASIS president, Mustafa Jabbar, president of Bangladesh Computer Samity (BCS), said there is no alternative to ensuring that local entrepreneurs dominate the domestic market.
In Bangladesh, yearly turnover of the local ICT market is around Tk 500 crore but local ICT service makers are yet to gain the confidence of both private and public institutions. It means foreign IT firms are bagging a majority of the large-scale projects in the country
Bangladesh's IT industry has been growing on die sly, driven by about 20,000 professionals. But the sector has felt the absence of infrastructure, such as an IT- Park or Hi-Tech Park.
The idea of establishing such infrastructure is not new. The government allocated land to develop a Software Technology Park (STP) at Mohakhali and Hi-Tech Park at Kaliakair, a few years back. But the government s short sightedness has limited project execution to land allocation alone.
The BASIS budget proposal suggested that there should be an allocation ofTk 300 crore for the development of the Mohakhali Software Technology Park (STP) and Tk 700 crore for the Hi-Tech Park at Kaliakair in the forthcoming ADP.
Currently, as many as 500 software firms are now shipping products and services to the global market. Software makers exported products worth $25million
in the fiscal 2007-08 and are expected to export products worth $30 million in the current fiscal year.
The ICT industry boomed after the country's link up with information superhighways or undersea submarine cable in 2006.
But ICT stakeholders have raised demands for another submarine cable link-up in the last few years, as there have been more than two-dozen rounds of disruptions in the on-land fibre optic line, for which they incurred huge financial losses.
In its budget proposal, BCS urged the government to allocate funds to link the country with the existing submarine cable by extending the fibre optic backbone network.
At present, the single SMW-4 cable has a capacity to handle a 120Gb bandwidth, of which, Bangladesh currently subscribes to 24Gb. Of the total capacity, the country is able to utilise only 23 percent so far.
"If the government truly wants to shape up a Digital Bangladesh, the mass should be connected to the internet," said Jabbar.
Along with other demands, BCS also proposed to waive the existing 3 percent duty on computer imports. Presently, around 1.5 lakh computers are being imported each year.
Both the associations stressed policy execution. ' Right policy formulation and execution traditionally becomes an obstacle to development of the ICT sector," said the BASIS president
Stressing executing the ICT policy as soon as possible, Karim also said, "The government's dream to create a Digital Bangladesh is possible even before the said timeframe of2021. But for that, policies should be formulated cautiously."
hasan@thedailystar.net