3-day Commonwealth telecom forum begins in Dhaka
The 54th annual telecommunication forum of the Commonwealth countries started in Dhaka on Monday with a vision of ensuring technology affordability for the underprivileged population and cyber security for the users. Telecom minister Abdul Latif Siddique inaugurated the three-day Commonwealth Telecommunication Organisation 2014 forum at Radison Blu Hotel in the capital where senior government officials of 21 Commonwealth countries are attending this year.
The speakers at the forum stressed on ensuring affordability of technology for the underprivileged section of the population of the member countries including Bangladesh.
‘Women and rural youths are the two most underprivileged sections in Bangladesh who need greater exposure to information technology. The lack of education and availability of technology are the key reasons for that,’ information minister Hasanul Haque Inu said replying to a question in a session.
He also said the government needed to revise the taxation policy for the telecom sector in order to make it more business friendly.
Bangladesh Bank governor Atiur Rahman said the rural population was having trouble to get access to the ICT but financial inclusion was the key to engage them with the mainstream tech sector.
‘For example, mobile financial service is one of the most popular ICT services used by the rural populations in Bangladesh and it is gaining popularity every day,’ he said.
Atiur said the country now needed such more content like MFS in order to take the ICT to the next stage.
‘And enforcing the cyber security is very necessary while progressing towards a more inclusive ICT,’ he said.
CTO chairman Juma Kandie said empowering people with ICT was the goal of the forum.
‘ICT is the next big thing for development of any country. By connecting people across the globe technology empowers them and drive them to development,’ he said.
Kandie also stressed on cyber security for sustainable growth of the ICT sector.
State minister for ICT Division Junaid Ahmed Palak said that the present government was working for the vision of a digital Bangladesh.
‘We have union-level data centres which are empowering rural Bangladeshis. We are constantly working things better,’ he said.
Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission chairman Sunil Kanti Bose said mobile phone and internet had done a lot for the human civilisation.
‘The technological evolution in Bangladesh is very fast and the government will release 700-Megahertz spectrum in 2015,’ he said.
CTO secretary general Tim Unwin and ICT Division secretary of Bangladesh Nazrul Islam Khan also spoke, among others.
-With New Age input
