Ensuring sustainable digital transformation

From a Millennium Development Goals champion to an out of sorts Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) achieve, Bangladesh is lagging behind in most of its apparently comfortably achievable goals goals after the pandemic. According to the sustainable development report 2022, our country tops India and Pakistan, but Myanmar, Nepal, Bhutan, and Sri Lanka are doing better than Bangladesh in several respects. The previously admirably pace maintained by Bangladesh has slowed down to a certain degree.

There is extensive talk about hunger, poverty, child mortality, and economic growth. Of course, we made commendable progress in those cases, but it feels like we almost forgot about taking the next step. SDG16 about peace, justice, and strong institutions has taken a backward step. I believe that we are failing to create strong institutions and this is where our achievements are failing to become sustainable.

Let us talk about a very common scenario in our government offices. E-filing (e-nothi), E-ticketing, E-tender, E-passport, all of them are now a reality because of the fantastic vision of “Digital Bangladesh”. These adoptions have illuminated our government offices, but there is darkness under the lamp, too. Sometimes it is darker than our imagination! The “Drafts For Approval” culture still exists very much in our offices where the soft copy of the file is printed, which gets the same treatment just like the old system! After some drafting and approval, it is finally written on the e-platform and, in the process, numerous fresh papers find their way to the rubbish can.

We have also experienced the Shohoz rail ticket scam, where the e-ticketing system was already in existence. Even so, the vicious cycle of passport corruption still is there today, and you can see its footprints in the single-table shops just outside every passport office.

So, the obvious question arises: what are we missing out on? The answer is obvious, but also quite complicated. The first reason behind the problem is our mindset. Our policymakers often buy systems just like a regular kid when they buy a toy. We got overwhelmed by a particular digital system in a developed country, and without carrying out any any feasibility study, we adopt it without considering the demographic diversity. We can consider the automated traffic light system as an example, used in Dhaka a couple of years back.

Moreover, we use digital solutions in a reactive way, not in a proactive manner. For instance, Evaly was operating in the online market without any audit from the concerned department for quite a long time. The ill-motive of Evaly was not lurking in the dark, but when the government interfered, the damage had already been done. The fear of digital ecommerce platforms is on the loose now, and we inadvertently pushed a promising sector some years back from flourishing. It would be the failure of proper “digital inclusion” if I could sum up the problem in a single phrase.

What come under the umbrella of digital inclusion in a sustainable organizational perspective is digital auditing, strong digital leadership, and digital data analytics for creating valuable information and eventually managing the information to establish a better digital ecosystem that ensures the righteous access to and use of information for transparency. Eventually, it will create a pathway to build effective, accountable, and inclusive institutions at all levels, which will integrate SDGs into our national strategies.

Alas! We are terribly failing at it. Our digital adaptations in various organizations look like a flick in the early stages, but in the long run, they end up declining in service standards. We are also very poor at good data sourcing from our ground level, which can be used as a raw material for digital inclusion. A total restoration of the digital policy framework is needed by any means where our youth, who are unemployed on a large scale, should be absorbed as an important critical catalyst for our effective organizations’ transformational change.

Over the last decade or so, Bangladesh did well in the MDGs’ economic and social indicators. If we can use the power of proper digitalization it offers, we can secure good position to perform as an intellectual leader of SDGs. To achieve this we have to improve our vulnerable organizations by proper digitalization policy which will allow us to fulfill the core aspirations of attainting “leave no one behind”.

The writer is a freelance contributor