The fact that Bangladesh has earned $592 million from the export of IT and IT related services in FY22 -- marking a 94.91% increase on a year-on-year basis and effectively doubling its revenue from the export of products and services produced by the IT sector -- is extremely commendable. Bangladesh has tall ambitions of becoming a knowledge-based economy in the next two decades, and the world is already experiencing the effects of the fourth industrial revolution. Looking at the latest numbers, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that we are very much on track on meeting both of these conditions.
Ever since the turn of the last century, our IT sector has been steadily growing. What started out as mainly customer and professional support has boomed to an industry that exports software, provides custom solutions to huge conglomerates, and harnesses the power of the internet to provide professional services to highly skilled professionals.
We have also seen companies foraying into the world of blockchain and digital entertainment in the last couple of years, with more and more innovative services being offered on almost a monthly basis. If such a trend continues, then we can be reassured that the future of IT in the country is indeed going to be positive.
However, this doesn’t mean that we can be complacent and take a back seat as the young minds of the country work themselves to the bones. There remains a huge market of freelancers in the country that still need to be properly incentivized and recognized. The education offered to children in the national curriculum when it comes to dealing with various aspects of the IT sector is also lacking. The incentives that are extended towards the heavy hitters of the economy -- such as the RMG industry -- need to be extended towards the IT sector as well. We also need to put an emphasis on domestic consumption as foreign demand is not enough for a holistic development of the sector.
All in all, while our advance along the digital sphere has been commendable, more needs to be done. We have both national ambitions and international opportunities and obligations to transform Bangladesh into an IT powerhouse. Let us not let this momentum go to waste.