Bangladesh to launch 20K sites for e-services boost

The Bangladesh government says it plans to launch 20,000 Web sites by 2015 in order to bring e-services to the masses as part of its Digital Bangladesh vision.

Local newspaper The Daily Star reported Monday that these sites will be developed and hosted by the government under the National Portal Framework (NPF) in districts, subdistricts, divisions, ministries and directorates, according to Anir Chowdhury, policy adviser for Access to Information (A2I) at the Prime Minister's Office (PMO).

Scheduled to launch in July this year, the NPF is being developed both by the government and the Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS) to extend e-services and information to citizens, the report stated.

The Web sites are part of the government's vision for Digital Bangladesh, and will contain various types of information and services including updates regarding the country, unions, social safety nets, and disaster warning. There will also be documents on land management and forums for farmers and fishery workers, said Chowdhury in the report.

According to Chowdhury, the government will finance training officials to operate and update the sites' content. Content providers will also be able to update and share data, integrating them with current and future e-services.

The Bangladeshi government earlier announced plans to connect the country's rural areas with high-speed broadband by December 2013 with an investment of 7.19 billion taka (US$88,220), The Daily Star said.