Better Stories Limited, an ideas agency, on Wednesday became the Bangladesh champion of the Coding Your Opportunity contest organised jointly by the World Bank and Microsoft Ltd in Dhaka. Robotics Association from Nepal was also announced champion of Nepal in the contest. Coding Your Opportunity was held as annual regional grant competition of the WB for the youth-led organisations and NGOs.
Better Stories Limited won the award among four finalists from Bangladesh for its project to provide the slum children with IT education and will also receive $10,000 grant for implementing the project.
‘South Asia is home to world’s largest working age youth population. Learning about Coding and computing has become an essential job-skill in today’s world,’ World Bank Bangladesh acting country head Christine Kimes said in an award giving ceremony at a city hotel.
She said the competition would create awareness about coding and help the condition of the participating countries for gainful employment.
Microsoft Bangladesh country manager Sonia Bashir Kabir said the demographic advantage of Bangladesh would help get new investment in the field of information technology.
‘Bangladesh is a country with population of 160 million people where 50 per cent of them are under the age of 25. I think investing, promoting and encouraging the youth will only make the county better,’ she said.
She also said that the young programmers and software engineers should focus on health and education as their much demand for such services across the globe.
Microsoft’s corporate social responsibility lead for Asia Pacific Clair Deevy said that her organisation, through its global YouthSpark programme was committed in helping young people around the world to achieve their employment, education or entrepreneurship dreams.
Chief executive officer of bdjobs.com AKM Fahim Mashrur and University Grant Commission member Mohibur Rahman also spoke at the programme.
-With New Age input
