Prospects of Young Girls an Assessment on Mobile Application

Prospects of young girls

An Assessment on Mobile Application Development in Bangladesh

Sponsored by

UNESCO Dhaka Office House # 122, Road #01, Block-F

Banani, Dhaka-1213

Study conducted by

International Institute of Media and E-Journalism (IIMEJ) Address: Rasul View, Level 7, 65 Mymensingh Lane, Banglamotor, Dhaka-1000, Bangladesh. E-mail: [email protected]; Web: www.iimej.com

Date of Submission: December 10, 2015

Table of Contents

I. Executive Summary------4 II. Methodology------7

Interviews

1. Zunaid Ahmed Palak, State Minister, Ministry of ICT------29 2. Mina Masuduzzaman, Deputy secretary, ICT Division. ------35 3. S M Ashraf Abir, CEO and Director of MCC Limited. ------45 4. Munir Hasan, General Secretary, BDOSN. ------55 5. Samira Juberi Himika, MD, Team Engine, Dir. BASIS WF------65 6. Eashika Naznin, Software Engineer, Ergoventures Ltd------72

Part-1: Introduction 1.1 An Overview------8 1.2 Networks coverage maps------11 1.3 Popular phone brands; trend analysis------21 1.4 Participation of women in ICT ------23

1.4.1 Benefits of ICT for women------24 1.4.2 Women in ICT------24 1.4.3 Problems in involvement of women in ICT------26

Part-2: Survey Analysis ------30

Part-3 : Mobile Application Trainers

Overview------35

a. Ministry of ICT with MCC------37 b. EATL------40 c. Basis Institute of Technology and Management------41 d. Boot Camp------41 e. YPSA------46 f. Bangladesh Women in Technology (BWIT) ------47

Part-4 : Local and Regional App Competitions a. National Hackathon 2014------50 b. National Mobile Application Award 2015------54 c. National Award 2014------57 d. EATL-Prothom Alo Apps contest 2015------59 e. BWIT Mobile Application Development Contest ------63 f. Nasa Space Apps Contest------66 g. Firefox App Challenge Bangladesh 2014------68 h. Mbillionth Award South Asia------70

Part-5 : Locally Developed Apps and Apps for the People with Disability

5.1 Locally Developed Apps------73 a) Bangladesh Constitution------74 b) Maa O Shishu------75 c) Pusti Kotha------77 d) Maya Apa------79 e) RTIA Bangladesh------80 f) Agriculture Info Service------82

g) Village Court------83 h) Government Services------84 i) Green Life------85 j) Breast Screening------86 k) Bkash Flexi------87 l) Momota------89 m) E- Joyeeta------90 n) Bangla Boipoka------91

5.2 Apps for the People with Disability

a) Shobdo------93 b) Old Care Home------94 c) Talking Eyes------95

Part-6: Conclusion and Recommendations

6.1 Conclusions------97

6.2 Recommendations------98

Appendix a) List of institutions------100 b) Survey Questionnaires------104 c) Training Manual------108 d) Profile of the Contractor (IIMEJ) ------127

Executive Summary

This report was originally prepared as a part of UNESCO’s activity to inform about the involvement of women in ICT and app development sector of Bangladesh, initiatives to involve them more and recommendation to improve the scenario. To be more specific the objective of this report is to fill up the gap of women participation in ICT development of Bangladesh especially in app development through finding the reasons of less involvement of women and solution to them.

In the final version of this report presents a critical research on present situation from both educational and industrial perspective of women employment in ICT and app development industry, infrastructure, educational and training facilities, drawbacks mainly societal and environmental barriers to women to get engage, impact of academic initiatives, and role of public and private organization and suggestions to improve the women participation. Its begins with sampling the industry situation and training facilities to review them purposefully to consider the common theoretical roots, policies to increase women training and education on ICT and app development, in depth description of selected arena need development with examples from companies and training institutes. The usual conclusion and recommendations offered various steps to be taken by both public and private sector from the research finding by analyzing the survey questionnaire intended to provide knowledge on increasing learning and training facilities, raising societal awareness on importance of participation of women in ICT and app development

sector, increase budget and infrastructure facilities under the practical framework to create sustainable, secured and equal involvement of female entrepreneurs and specialists in ICT sector of Bangladesh.

The research started with a simple observation about the female participation of women in ICT sector and the question aroused from that

“Why women involvement in ICT sector of Bangladesh is less than other developing countries and what initiatives are needed to increase their involvement?”

The basic search enclosed both primary and secondary sources of information to identify the study objectives. At last over 150 companies and training institutes were reviewed for preliminary sources of information and numerous studies, article and news were selected for secondary sources of information for diversified data related to philosophical, psychological, technical and institutional to understand the situation of women engagement in ICT sector and app development of Bangladesh.

To organize and consolidate vast array of information gathered from survey and secondary sources the report was structured on the basis of some points of inquiry

 Does women engagement in ICT sector and app development of Bangladesh is satisfactory?  What are the limitations or risk factors behind less engagement?  What are the sustainability ratios of women against male who are getting education and training facilities?  What initiatives need to be taken to increase women involvement in this sector?

 What are the future plans of public and private bodies and institutions to motivate women to get involvement in the sector more?

In response this research report found to some general conclusion mentioned below;

 Though many females are getting academic certification from universities and training from several institutions on ICT, societal and environmental pressure hindering them to get engage or sustain in the sector for the long term. But in recent years especially last year and recent year the graph of participation in training are upward.  Sustainability ratios of women in this sector are very low. Entrepreneurs and trainers mentioned lower budget, less infrastructure, less societal security, family pressure, less access to financial help, lack of flexibility and grooming in learning place and workplace, adherence to theoretical knowledge, lack of involvement with industry through job placement and part- time jobs etc. are responsible for the less sustainability ratio of women in ICT sector of Bangladesh.  Better nationwide future plan to train up women including public and private sector, proper education focusing on practical knowledge, increasing social awareness on importance of women involvement in the sector, family engagement during university education and training, nourish potential female coder and developer, increase grooming session, workshop, job fair, ensure flexibility in workplace, enhancing security,

transportation facilities and so on are important to increase women engagement in ICT sector.

Methodology

As this is an extensive research on the training of app development for the youth conducted by government, International Institute of Media & E-Journalism (IIMEJ) has concentrated on primary data collection procedures, which includes a survey, phone calls, and direct interviews of the relevant personnel.

Primary Sources Survey: The survey was conducted nationwide and there were 100 respondents. There are two set of questionnaire. One is to collect data about women working on various app developer companies, and another one is to gather information about the app development training targeting the youth and especially for the women. The survey questionnaires and the list of respondents attached at the appendix section.

Phone Calls: After sending the survey form link to the possible respondents, we make phone calls to make sure that they received the forms. Moreover, data collectors of IIMEJ have visited physically to the respondents to collect the responses.

Interviews: We interviewed the key persons of the app-training initiatives of government of Bangladesh directly.

Secondary Sources There are some URLs and hyperlinks used in this report, which are secondary sources. The training institutes’ websites are also very good sources of secondary data. There are also some published news links at the bottom of some paragraph for authentication and further reference.

Part 1 | Introduction

1.1 An overview of mobile phone trend in Bangladesh

Global mobile phone use trend has been increased in recent time in large number, which also influenced mobile market and use trend of Bangladesh one of the most populated and least developed countries in Asia. The demand for smartphone use increased than before and users are leaping from flip-phone or feature phone to smartphones for their various features and convenience of use.

In previous time Bangladesh mobile market was dominated by the Finnish giant mobile phone manufacturer NOKIA. Nokia’s feature phones competed perfectly with other giants’ phone brand like Samsung, BlackBerry, and Phillips and so on because of low price and durable models. But now others local and china made phone brands like Symphony, Walton, Maximus and others are dominating marketing with the lower price. People now want a smartphone for many solutions to their daily life problems related to business, job and social networking facilities.

In terms of operating systems android phones are holding around 57% market share in the market of Bangladesh. Feature phones mainly operated by Java operating system is in the 2nd place by 19%, iOS 16%, Windows phone 7% and Firefox phones are holding 1% of market share.

In terms of brand Symphony, the first ever native company to introduce local brand in the market, is holding the largest part of the market share by 53%. Main local competitor Walton is holding 12% but growing more by developing better features with lower price. Samsung, the international giant is getting high competition from these two local brand but still famous with the 2nd position by holding 14% of market share. The remaining 21% is dominated by brands like Asus, Lumia, Maximus and Lava and so on.

Several mobile operator companies are providing service for phone call, internet service and other value added services : Banglalink, Robi, GrameenPhone, Airtel, Citycell and the only government telecom service provider Teletalk.

Present smartphones sales growth in Bangladesh is higher than the global average 20.3%. This is due to the availability of low cost Internet service throughout the country, business and other daily activities getting influenced by mobile phones, and because demographics are consisted mostly by young generation. Even banking activities, money transaction, college, university admission procedures, business tender, health help, agro help, access to other information are now mostly completed by mobile phone. According to BTRC- Bangladesh Telephone Regulatory Commission’s report, GSM subscriber increased to 119.62 million this year. But still there is scope for expansion as only 67.1 million are unique users. Bangladesh is now the 12th most mobile-friendly country in the world, with more than 25 million mobile internet users.

Government’s rules are giving competitive advantaged to the local brand. A 5% Advanced Income Tax besides regular 15% VAT on importing mobile phones are increasing the price of international brands. For this reason, many other international companies are now planning to start introducing their own local brand

in the market. However, deregulations in other sectors like foreign direct investment, and the development of telecom infrastructure will boost Bangladeshi mobile phone manufacturing industry potentially resulting in higher rate price reduction in future.

Mobile use increase in Bangladesh is not due to the phones-devices only. It’s for what they are able to do for the people. Since “Digital Bangladesh” has been the main slogan of present (2009-2015) ruling government of Bangladesh for development for the past 6 years, everything is getting digitalized and many new services have been deployed. People can get recommendations on issues of their daily life through using internet, information and even directions on various social issues and health through the use of smartphones.

1.2 Networks coverage maps and current speed of service providers

Presently Bangladeshi mobile operators industry and market is dominated by six brands: GP, Banglalink, Robi axiata, Teletalk, Citycell, and Airtel. At first 2G network was introduced in 1992 at Bangladesh with text message and data service. As of today, operators are offering a wide 3G network. Grameen Phone is the market leader with almost 50 million customers (http://www.telenor.com/media/articles/2014/grameenphone-reaches-50-million- customers/) . These operators are namely:

Grameen Phone- Joint venture (62% Telenor+ 38% Grameen Telecom)

Banglalink – Joint venture by Orascom Telecom, Egypt

Robi- Joint venture of Axiata telecom, Japan

Airtel- Joint venture of Bharti, India

Teletalk- public limited company owned by the government of Bangladesh

Citycell- Joint venture of SingTel Asia Pacific investment Pvt. Limited

Grameenphone has coverage in almost 98% of the whole country. It’s now providing 3G in whole country. Banglalink is at the 2nd place with coverage of almost 95% of the country’s network. Robi and Airtel are almost equal and planning to be merged within 2015-2018. Grameen Phone and Banglalink have almost 80% of 3G coverages in the country. The full network coverage scenario is given below.

Image: Grameen Phone Network coverage map

Source: www.opensignal.com

Grameenphone offers a 2.00mb/s download speed and 0.8mb/s upload speed with 423ms average latency and 91% network reliability. Its download speed is more than global average speed of 1.8mb/s.

Source: www.opensignal.com

Image: Statistics Table of GP, Source http://opensignal.com/networks/bangladesh/grameenphone-coverage

Banglalink, second largest telecom service provider in the country has an 1.6mb/s average download speed, 0.8mb/s upload speed with 274ms average latency and 89% network reliability.

Image: Network coverage map of Banglalink

Source: www.opensignal.com

Image: Statistics table of BL

Source: www.opensignal.com

Robi is another leading operator in the country which network coverage map is,

Image: Network Coverage Map of Robi

Source: www.opensignal.com

Image: Statistics table of Robi

Source: www.opensignal.com

Robi’s mobile tower number, signal readiness, cellular networks and Wi-fi hotspots are same as GP and BL.

Airtel, however operated by Bharti Telecom is popular among youth in the country with 88% network reliability which coverage maps, statistics table and network types are given below,

Image: Network coverage of Airtel

Source: www.opensignal.com

Image: Statistical Table of Airtel

Source: www.opensignal.com

Network tower, cellular networks, signal readiness and Wi-fi hotspots of Airtel resembles GP, BL and Robi.

Teletalk is the only government operated mobile telecom service provider in the country controlled and monitored by BTCL and has network reliability of 92%. Its network coverage, network types and statistical table are given below,

Image: Network coverage of TeleTalk

Source: www.opensignal.com

Image: Statistical Table of TeleTalk

Source: www.opensignal.com

1.3 Popular phone brands: trend analysis

Mainly, Android phones are holding major parts of mobile phone market share in terms of operating share. In terms of phone-devices, the market shows the presence of many international brands, like Samsung, Nokia, HTC, LG, Asus and others. But international brands are increasingly facing high competition by two local brands, namely Symphony and Walton.

According to Cyber Media Research (http://cmrindia.com/bangladesh-mobile- handset-shipments-touch-4-6-million-units-in-q4-cy-2012-homegrown-vendor- symphony-mobile-leads-the-market/) , sales of smartphones in Bangladesh is

increasing and the market is led by low cost devices. 0.7 Million units were sold in the year 2014 and the last quarter of the year showed the highest sales growth. Smart-phones occupies 30% of the total handsets held by consumers (http://cmrindia.com/beta/?tag=bangladesh-mobile-handset). Sales growth in Bangladesh mobile market is higher than global average, since the price for a basic smartphone ranges between only 4000 BDT to 6000 BDT (http://www.lightcastlebd.com/blog/2015/01/market-insight-market-smartphones- bangladesh). Symphony, the market leader, started its business in 2012. (http://www.lightcastlebd.com/blog/2015/01/market-insight-market-smartphones- bangladesh) The following picture shows the statistics of last quarter mobile sales of 2014 :

The fact that Symphony and Walton are dominating the market share against others international famous brands, it’s the sign that people tend to buy and use

low price smartphones. Surveys show that many consumers are highly satisfied with the service of these brands’ phones and their features (http://www.lightcastlebd.com/blog/2015/01/market-insight-market-smartphones- bangladesh).

Following the deployment of 3G in 2013 for data services, the sales of smartphones heavily increased. “We are guessing sale of 250,000 3G-enabled sets on an average per month. Tablet sales will also be significant,” said the mobile head of Samsung Electronics in 2013 (http://www.dhakatribune.com/commerce/2013/sep/04/bangladesh-market-eyes- tk25bn-3g-handset-sales-month), Bangladesh Hasan Mehedi. From the analysis of the market share scenario and of the sales growth rates, shows the evidence of the correlation with the deployment of 3G over the country: a further development of 3G, increase smartphone sales.

Symphony officials claimed that the company is holding 60% of the market share by introducing new phones periodically. “We are top of smartphone market in Bangladesh as Symphony sets are low priced, but preserve quality, offering diversity in features,” said Md Rafiq Uddin, head of marketing of Symphony in Bangladesh ( http://www.dhakatribune.com/commerce/2013/sep/04/bangladesh- market-eyes-tk25bn-3g-handset-sales-month.

However, a phenomenon of “fraud 3G” enabled phones sellers are hampering the market share. A report of Dhaka Tribune stated that India could not properly implemented 3G and 3G enabled services due to fraud phones. If customers change their phone it’s mostly for fake replica phone, less durable, bad service, few features and so on. Most of the consumers who changes brand move to other international or local brands like symphony, Walton, Lava seen from the trend.

(http://www.dhakatribune.com/commerce/2013/sep/04/bangladesh-market-eyes- tk25bn-3g-handset-sales-month) .

1.4 Participation of women in ICT and mobile apps sector of Bangladesh

Women engagement in mobile app development sector of Bangladesh is very low but started. Participation of women, especially students, in computer programming and mobile app development is almost at zero level (www.researchgate.net/profile/Sharmin_Akther2/publication/23617). However, there are comforting signals showing some positive changes. Women are increasingly participating in app development workshops and programming (coding) competitions, and their results are also satisfactory, with an average success rate and eagerness to engage in related sectors. Recent App-development training activities involving women, attracted the participation of the government sector, private organizations and IT entrepreneurs to train them. Just few years ago, there were no initiatives targeting solely women in App development and computer programming as these types of works has been considered for men. They had to participate in training course or workshops with men. This perception of programming related work is men’s work is getting changed slowly. Separated training programs, workshops and seminars targeting women in these sectors are being organized by several training institutes, like Chittagong Mohila Polytechnic Institute. In future said by officials Some private organizations ran "CodeItGirls", a small competition on mobile app development and computer programming only for women, in 2014 .

1.4.2 Women in ICT

Unfortunately, there is no much reliable information about the involvement of women in ICT sector of Bangladesh. But from available statistics (ITU: http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Statistics/Pages/stat/default.aspx), it can be guessed that this is small amount. Apart educated and financially solvent women, most women use ICT in their workplace, or through mobile phones or sharing equipment from family members and friends. Women involved in ICT mainly work in computer aided designing (CAD), graphics design, composing, office programs for administration assistance and just recently in the App development sector. Many women entrepreneurs are doing business through ICT services (http://asiafoundation.org/in-asia/2014/05/14/ict-innovations-connect-bangladeshs-women- entrepreneurs/) However, accessing and harnessing these tools, require some degree of literacy, education and communication skills. Bangladesh shows improvements in literacy, especially among young women, . but today’s job market shows an increasing need for technically skilled people (http://www.uis.unesco.org/Education/Documents/UIS-literacy-statistics-1990-2015-en.pdf) .

The ICT division of Bangladesh government, BITM, MCC limited, BWIT, BASIS and many other organizations are now providing training to women. The Ministry of Posts, Telecommunication and information technology has started training for women in 2012 to train them as freelancers (http://www.thedailystar.net/a-new- bangladesh-17482) . 112 App developer companies are currently working in the country alongside many freelancer developers, among which around 60 firms are major player. These firms are developing several categories of Apps such as educational, informative, games, entertainment, healthcare, utilities, financial and so on. The App download statistics are satisfactory and 22 firms are earning their

100% revenue from exporting mobile app through direct sales and sales in app stores to meet the local and international demand.

Of these Apps, 63% are developed for Android and iOS and rest for other platforms. 46% of firms have between 10-25 employees

(www.basis.org.bd/resource/ICT%20Sector%20Study%20Bangladesh.pdf). Data Soft BD Ltd has about 270 employees. Among these employees there are very few women. One of the major players in the Bangladeshi industry is MCC Ltd, with a portfolio of 150+ apps: the company has 18 App developers, of which only 2 are female. Bangladesh achieved some top position in many freelancing markets but few of these freelancers are female. Only 13% of total workforce in IT sector is represented by women and only 2% firms are led by women. Some high profile female IT entrepreneurs from Bangladesh are:

 Sonia Kabir Bashir (Country Managing Director, Dell Bangladesh)  Shazia Omar (Head of Advocacy, Shiree)  Taslima Miji (CEO, Techmania)  Sumaya Kazi (CEO & founder of Sumazi)  Munazah Chowdhury (Head of Global Sales Technology, Google)  Sadequa Hassan Sejuti (MD, FSB Ltd)  Dr. Anannya Raihan (CEO, DNet)  Afreen Hossain (Founder, CodeitGirl)

1.4.3 Issues affecting the involvement of women in the ICT sector:

Bangladesh is not getting many women in the ICT and app development sector despite the fact that there are many female students in IT and CSE department of

several public and private universities in bachelor courses getting academic knowledge in ICT sector. The reasons behind this situation are many: societal, family, institutional and personal.

Societal barriers are one of the important barriers to the involvement of women in IT sector. There seems to be a general opinion that IT is not a women friendly sector for employment. For example, TopofStack, a software company, reports that it has no future plan for women to engage them in their organization when interviewed for this paper, even it currently doesn’t have any women in the firm. Even family hinders women to build career in IT sector. Security, distance to the workplace and working time are also problems that may affect women’s inclusion. Md. Mynul Islam, Lead software engineer of “MCC Ltd.” a major Bangladeshi company, said that the company has a policy to include at least one female developer per 5 male developers, and 1 female intern per 2 male interns. However, they reported that most of the girls quit their jobs due to the distance of workplace, time, and security in transports. Some reported marriage as another cause. Mr. Mynul said “we had many girls highly potential during our training and internship program. We regularly offer them job and help if they want to become entrepreneur. But the sustainability rate of these girls is very low, like 2 out of the 10 at the end of the training. 4 skilled female developer of ours have gone for job switching (mostly to the banking sector), marriage and time”. He also added that “there is no timeframe for work in IT sector. An employee might need to stay few hours late in office, which seems problematic for women as they don’t feel secure in travelling at nighttime. Sometimes they also can’t cope up in the sector for no reasons.”. MCC and many others organizations try to provide transportation facilities for women employee, but these solutions are not sufficient, as they come from different places.

Women entrepreneurs in the IT sector may have to travel a lot, meet clients deal with them and many other activities. Afreen Hossain, founder of CodeitGirl, said that “many women cannot meet these necessities simply because their family doesn’t want them to do these”. Creditability issue is another problem: by experiencing hindrance in academic and job sector, many women start believing they don’t have enough brain or intelligence to do IT work. Furthermore, they face questions about their ability and time-availability for doing the work.

Another major problem stated by Ms. Afreen and Mr. Mynul for women to become entrepreneurs in the IT sector is the difficulty to access funding. This is a major problem even for male entrepreneurs, since they need a guarantor. And when it comes to women, it is almost impossible to get a guarantor as women are not still economically independent in the society. There are numerous newspaper reports, articles and books regarding this.

Academic syllabus is not necessarily adapted to these new ICT industry needs, and may discourage students from getting interested in the IT sector. Mr. Mynul noted that “they just learned theoretical knowledge. But we need practical experience. In order to reverse this trend, Universities should adopt different strategies, for example by involving students in practical IT projects, especially female students, and let them develop personal interest in App development, including through working with IT business firms. Universities should also nourish students’ eagerness on career in IT sector and groom them to achieve that and make it happen by creating job facilities through affiliation with app development organizations.

We are ready to inspire women entrepreneurs

Zunaid Ahmed Palak State Minister, Ministry of ICT Peoples Republic of Bangladesh

We (The Ministry of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) took several initiatives for the development of the women in Bangladesh. Which include, basic training in ICT, training of freelancing and so one. Alongside these we also started an initiative titled “Bari Boshe Borolok” (be the millionaire working at home) project. This project will be re-instated soon with a new title and new arrangements. Currently we do not have any particular arrangement of Mobile Apps training for the women. But we observed huge participation of women in the 500 apps project of the government. Many of them made apps on their own. While this 500 apps initiative was on the process, we arranged several nationwide workshops and training sessions. The participation ratio of the women at those events was 30-35%. We want them (women) to come in the process of app making. We are ready to inspire them. If required, we are willing to help them also.

One thing, we also noticed that, the number of women programmer in Bangladesh is relatively poor. This hurts us. Women will do well if they engaged in this sector. Because naturally they are cool-headed, well organized and with clear thoughts. They do not rush of anything. They will certainly do well in programming. I wish, they will do better than the boys if they have the chance.

For these reasons, we are going to organize a programming contest exclusively for the girls. This will start from December 2015.

Part-2: Survey Analysis

15 companies and training institutes were visited and brought under survey. Questionnaires were also sent electronically using Google forms. Only three respondents sent their responses through these forms which can be found in the following links-

1. http://goo.gl/forms/Nnpf5lc11o 2. http://goo.gl/forms/1X9ZVQn7KN

It is found that all training institutes and almost half of the companies also arrange several training program on app development. Almost 85% of the companies build Apps for Android and iOS platform and 15% other.

The main types of Apps developed by these companies are: entertainment, business, games, informative, food and etc. Mainly 50% of the developed App are entertainment and games related while 30% of them are informative, business and educational and rest 20% are healthcare, food and others Apps.

80% of App development companies of Bangladesh were founded by young persons between 26 to 30 years old. In these companies 80% of present board member are youth, with an average of 3 to 5 members. In some cases all board members are young and below 35yrs.

Unfortunately, the survey conducted by IIMEJ research team has been highlighted that only 50% of these firms have a female member on their management boards. Moreover, the number of females in 40% of the companies is as low as 2. Only one firm has 4 female on its board. From field observation and survey, it seems that female founded App development companies in Bangladesh are also very few (3- 4). 60% of firms employ 10-12 App developers, against an average 5-6 App developers for the rest. 90% of these App developers are youth. Most of the CEOs or CTOs of App development companies stated that whatever the age range of founder is, they want to hire young App developers as young people are energetic and career oriented. They also reported that programming and UI design can be seen as boredom work to many people. Only enthusiastic young people find fun in creating something new through coding and designing. It is satisfactory that 90% of App developers from Bangladesh represent young, but it is worrisome that only few of these developers are female. Around 70% of the firms have some female App developers, but their number and ratio to male colleague is very low: 10:2. According to this survey, the highest number of female App developers is working at EATL (4 out of 25). This percentage and ratios are indicating that female participation in App development market of Bangladesh is very low, compared to other developing countries.

Most of the Private training institutes provide professional training in App development of a 3 to 6 months duration. Every institute arranges an average of 7

to 10 training programs per year,. Creative IT Ltd arranges 12 training programs on App development per year, the country’s highest.

Per program, each institute enrolled 20-25 students and all are young. Most organizations design their modules targeting students from 18 to 30 years old. 70% of the organizations have facilities for physically disabled people. But the job- sustainability ratio of the female students which have been enrolled in these various training programs, is not good. Most of the companies reported that only 2 to 4 female students will effectively work in the industry after the completion of the course.

Only Creative IT Ltd and BITM (Basis Institute of Technology and Management) noted that due to their job placement facilities, internship program, entrepreneurial program and access to finance, they reached a 10:6 ratio for female job employment sustainability.

BITM provide stipend to students while Creative IT ltd helps students to get loans from banks with the help of Bangladesh Bank. Though BITM and Creative IT report substantial efforts to provide facilities and motivational schemes to female students to enter and remain in the job-market, their sustainability ratios is in the end not too much different than other institutes which are not providing these facilities.

Institutes as well as App development companies noted some limitations and risk factors for these low sustainability ratios.

MCC ltd stated that most of the female students drop out from these training courses, while another company, 3itemplate, noted that it’s generally observed that female students lose their interest in App developing in the middle of their course. Societal and environmental issues are main causes influencing their decisions. Many trainers and managers stated that family pressures, security issues, and lack of time flexibility are among the main reasons for the dropout of female students. The provision of transportation facilities from workplace was indicated as a way to improve the scenario.

One of the Academic Counselors of DIIT (Daffodil Institute of IT) stated that she is going to quit her job because of continuous pressure from her family about the care of her children. She also added “see, what I got from this career? Nothing, after this long time of service I have to leave the sector for my family pressure. So, what about my studies or my career? Is there anyone to think about it?” she said that most of the organizations whether training or production related work for profit. They don’t pay heed to other problems as they are getting male employee. If family engagement in this sector can be raised and companies can provide female

with some time flexibility and day care center in well-resourced companies will be very helpful.

Niloufer Akhter Dolly, AGM of Creative IT ltd told “I am working in this sector for 8 years. I arrive at office before others and left office after students and all other employees. Without co-operation of my family and husband it cannot be possible.”

She added that most of the females have to leave the job at a particular time due to marriage. To solve this problem family engagement in the industry is most important thing.

According to the statement, it can be said that the universities have a great role in this segment. Through the implementation of more practical syllabus, arranging training with affiliation, workshops and seminars to engage family and groom both students, family will be pragmatic steps.

Mr. Tariquzzaman, CTO of 3itemplate stated that government has to take the control with honesty and sincerity. If government monitors the whole system and set up benchmark for standard to increase women implement and forces other institutional framework to resolve these problems there will be more women in the ICT sector. He agreed with other managers and personnel in the sector that only strong public and private role playing can resolve these issues alongside increasing financial access, job placement, workshops, national promotion and social awareness, industry alliance with academic and training institutions, implement more practical syllabus, prevent brain drain by moving to other sector for job, provide better work environment and so on. The hope is that most of the training institutes and companies already understood the gap of women in the sector and

planning for sufficient initiatives to increase the engagement of women in ICT and app development sector of Bangladesh.

“Women participation in government’s app development workshops is about 30%-35%.”

Mina Masuduzzaman Deputy Secretary, ICT Division. Peoples Republic of Bangladesh

For developing 500 apps, there were different seminars and workshops arranged By ICT department in which the women participation was 30-35%.

The project was coordinated by boys and girls. But there was no separate arrangement for women-only training. But officials from the government took special care of girls in this manner.

We arranged numerous nationwide App development seminars and workshops. Attendance ratio of the female participants was satisfactory. In every programs the female participants was around 30% to 35%. In some cases the ratio was 40% too.

Apps have been developed through different processes. First the ideas are gathered. Then we knock the selected idea-makers and asked them how they are going to develop it, how the problem will be solved etc. Those who answered properly were selected finally for the app development project. Women's participation at those programs was also satisfactory.

The number of developed apps cannot be said specifically. But every app was a

bit team work and young women were also included at those projects. There is no exact statistics of the apps made by women.

However, it is the right time to initiate app development training/workshops for women particularly. We have to start from scratch if we have to do so.

ICT dept has undertaken some initiatives for only girls though there were no

specific app development training. "Bari Bose Borolok” (Be Rich staying home) is one of the projects. In this project women are given the opportunity to have basic training on ICT so that they could earn36 money by online job.

Part-3: Profile of Mobile Application Trainers (Government baked, NGOs and others)

Overview Government officials reported, that there are plans the training of young women but at present there is no ongoing project targeting the women. Government has strong concern regarding women in the ICT sector. But there is no App development program solely for the women as we came to know from the key interviewees (State Minister for ICT and others government officials).

MCC is conducting almost every training program initiated by the Ministry of ICT of Bangladesh. They are acting like a facilitator-wing in this regard. EATL also works for government projects.

BWIT is working as a common platform and facilitator for the young women who want to build their career or to become entrepreneur in this sector. Another non- government organization, YPSA, launched a program to train disabled peoples in the ICT sector. One interviewee from Dnet reported they also have future plans to launch ICT training program for young women in Bangladesh. Below are details of organizations that regularly conduct mobile App development trainings, some of which are also working as facilitators in the empowerment of young women through ICT training.

a) Ministry of ICT with MCC

Multimedia Content & Communications Ltd (MCC) has a number of programmes on mobile App training for youth in Bangladesh. MCC is a leading Bangladeshi IT company specialized in mobile applications, games, graphics and multimedia content development.

The Ministry of ICT arranges Android App Development Technical Training workshop for University Student, Freelancer, Software Developers or any individual. MoICT arranges this regularly by the help of MCC. The 5 days workshop held in different Divisions/Districts/Universities was part of the “National Mobile Application Development: Awareness and Capacity Building Program” with the goal of helping the youth of Bangladesh connect to the international mobile applications market. This is a Government baked initiative and there are numerous newspaper links regarding the activities.

Participants got free training of Android for 5 days, after which they were ready to make their own apps, and submit them to the App stores for monetization. All attendees got a National App Short Course Training Certificate recognized by Ministry of ICT (Annex D and Annex E).

Most of the Bangladesh Government’s App training initiatives are organized by MCC and they have already organized nationwide app trainings workshops.

Already 62 training programs have been conducted in 54 districts where 2387 people participated.

What the participants achieved:

a) Android App Development training b) Best Participants will receive a c) Gift Hamper from SYMPHONY/NOKIA d) National App Development Training Certificate e) Future business opportunity with local app store ie Grameen Phone Alo Ashbei, Symphony Fun Store & EATL App Store f) Virtual Expert Support till December 2014 g) 50% Discount on Advance Android App Development Course offered by BASIS

MCC has served many international companies, NGOs. MCC’s portfolio includes World Bank, Telenor and many others.

MCC was registered as a private limited company in 2009 as joint initiative of Development Research Network (DNET). The company was led by Ashraf Abir since its inception.

The Ministry of ICT, Bangladesh has undertaken ‘National Mobile Application Development: Awareness and Capacity Building’ program with the goal of helping the youth of Bangladesh connect to the international mobile applications market. MCC Ltd. is using their experience in mobile app development to aid the government in conducting this project.

As MCC also going to initiate a new app training- currently titled as Project M- Lab. Here the organization will provide an extra effort for the young women.

URLs http://mcc.com.bd http://mcc.com.bd/app-development-contents/

News: http://archive.thedailystar.net/beta2/news/moict-launches-national- mobile-application-development-program/ http://www.thedailystar.net/national-hackathon-winners-announced-55491

Contact: 6/12 Humayun Road, Block- B, Mohammadpur Dhaka-1207, Bangladesh

Tel:+88 02 8129193, [email protected]

b) EATL

This is also an App training wing of MoICT.

Ethics Advanced Technology Limited (EATL) is a private company with ICT services and solutions provider in Bangladesh established in November 1999. EATL has developed partnership and collaborations with Bangladeshi companies, private sector organizations, NGOs, donors, Government, IBM, Sun Oracle, TeleTalk, CityCell, GrameenPhone, Six Dee Telecom Solutions.

EATL launched the first ever mobile application store in Bangladesh in 2012 which is branded as ‘EATLApps’. EATL has launched country’s largest mobile annual application development contest known as ‘EATL-ProthomAlo Mobile Apps Development Contest’ for searching the brightest talents in Bangladesh.

c) Basis Institute of Technology and Management

BASIS started its own training activities in 2007. Later in 2012, BASIS institutionalized its training activities and set up BASIS Institute of Technology & Management (BITM) with the support of World Bank. BITM was established with a vision to be a world-class IT institute in Bangladesh for the purpose of enhancing the competitiveness of the IT Sector in Bangladesh by creating a pool of qualified IT professionals and quality certified IT companies.

d) Boot Camp

Under the National Mobile Application Development Awareness & Capacity Building Program, by the ICT Division, Bangladesh, grassroots level training workshops are being held all over the country. To uphold that progression 7 divisional boot camps have been planned to uphold that progression 7 divisional boot camps have been planned to be held in divisional headquarters. (http://www.nationalappsbd.com/?page_id=1738). Already 5 divisional boot camps completed in 5 divisions. The registration process is going on. And, it is an ongoing process. A Boot Camp is a short, intensive, and rigorous course of training. It is a correctional training camp to teach the green coders industry acceptable standards of development. The participants were selected from the participants of the training program organized by Ministry of ICT

Prizes & Fun:

 Offered 3 end-of-study “internship tickets” to the best rookies in the boot camp.  Chance to be the best Boot Camp Participants and win Gift Hampers from NOKIA/SYMPHONY/Grameen Phone  Meeting industry leaders

The agenda of the camp is as follows:

 Android Game Physics Engine: Game is a big industry  Using External Application Programming Interface (API): Technical Session Or Building Cloud-Powered Android Applications Government Innovation fund for you  Trouble Shooting Session: Most frequent problems  Preparation for Hackathon and National App Championship  And more tech session from super expert groups. *** (Detail schedule will be available soon)

Boot Camp at a glance:

Number of camps Division Number of Participants 1 Dhaka 396 1 Khulna 455 1 Sylhet 702 1 Chittagong 529 1 Rangpur 498

Training on Android Application Development

MCC Ltd. provides training on mobile application development. This course will build first stair to develop a complete mobile app that will comply industry standard.

Learning Outcomes: At the end of this course, participants will be able to:

 Develop a complete app leveraging different APIs;  Deployment of app to google play store;  App monetization technique. Learning Methodology

 Learning by Doing  PowerPoint Presentation  Quiz  Interactive Lecture  Question and answer session

Training Sessions and Content

Android Overview & Quick Start

Course objectives, Introduction to Android framework, Development environment, Android SDK overview, create a Hello World application in Android

Java Basics: Object Oriented Concept, Java Basics: Data Types, Conditions, Loops, Arrays, Classes and Objects, Inheritances, Basic GUIs, Multi-threading, Writing Java applications

Main Building Blocks of an Android Application: Component introduction, Activity, life cycle, View, Intent, Project organization (directories), Manifest, Resource directories, debugging an Android application

Basic Android User Interface: Layouts, Widgets: Button, TextView, Event listeners, SlidingDrawer, ScrollView, TabWidget, Screen size and screen orientation

Advanced Android User Interface: OptionMenu, CheckBox, DatePicker/TimePicker, ImageButton, ProgressBar, RadioGroup/RadioButton, Dialog: Alert, Custom, List, Radio

Advanced Android System Components: Context, Application, BroadcastReceiever, Threads (intro/review), Handlers/Loopers/Message Queues, Main UI Thread, AsyncTask, Services (Local and Remote)

SQLite Database: Introduction to SQLite, Creating, opening, and closing a database, working with inserts, updates, queries and deletes

Networking: Network Services, HTTP review, REST, JSON/XML/HTTP, Connectivity Manager

Multimedia and Content Providers in Android: Simple media playback, Simple video playback, Content providers MIME types, Adding, changing, and removing content

Mapping and Location Based Services: Using location based services, setting up your emulator with location based services, Creating Map-based activities

Profile of the Trainer Khaled Saifullah is currently working as Android Developer in Multimedia Content and Communications Ltd. His current roles not only pursue him to develop large and complicated android applications but also lead him to manage multiple projects efficiently. During his last 3 years of successful career he developed 10+ large-scale Android applications. Saif built various wonderful mobile applications for Dhaka Stock Exchange, Tourism Board Bangladesh, and Apps Leader. In recent years Saif conducted more than 15 training programs on android application development for government organizations, corporations and educational institutions. He played a vital role of Trainer for National Mobile application Awareness and Capacity Development program by providing national

IT capacity building training in 9 districts in Bangladesh. Mr Saif holds a Bachelor degree in CSE from University of Liberal Arts, Bangladesh.

M-Lab for Women

S M Ashraf Abir CEO & Director of MCC Limited.

There is no special app development initiative for women right at this moment. This issue was not treated as special by public or private organizations. However, the presence of women in government’s initiated or privately initiated projects were noticeable.

In different periods, we arranged seminar outside at Dhaka, had noticed that the presence of girls is well enough and they had stayed till the last moment of the ceremony and completed given tasks.

I have seen the presence of girls were 11%-12% on those program. From this we had take initiative to create a Lab named M-Lab. By this Lab we will start mobile based start up coaching and will teach young women practically. In this project will have a specific arrangement for girls and they will be trained up separately.

This Lab will start its operation from next January. If girls come with any idea about business and tech, we will arrange training for them. We want to involve women entrepreneurs in this industry.

We can see the prospects for girls in mobile app project. It seems that they are eager to work with app. They are more attentive than boys. They have the lowest rate for incomplete task. That is why, they will do good in this segment of ICT.

But willing to start something new,46 not commonly seen in the women. We have to put that in their mind from the very basic level of the education. Because, when they will be at University level, the inspiration may not work. But, again in my opinion being an entrepreneur is a common quality. It cannot be taught. But girls can do better if they have proper guidance.

e) YPSA

YPSA is a voluntary, nonprofit, social development organization. YPSA identifies itself as an inter-dependent but truly a Bangladeshi social development organization that focuses mainly on the South and South Eastern parts of the country (with special importance on the Chittagong Division , Chittagong Hill Tracts -CHT and coastal areas).

This organization has a project titled- Empowering Youth with Disabilities through market driven ICT skills. The objective of this initiative is to achieve ICT based capacity for youths with disabilities to exercise equal employment and business opportunities from the society& state by using their ICT skills. The duration of the course is 12 months and there is no specific timeline.

News Link: http://blogs.worldbank.org/endpovertyinsouthasia/empowering-youth- disabilities-bangladesh-providing-ict-skills-0 http://ypsa.org/2013/09/training-on-empowering-youth-with-disabilities-through- market-driven-ict-skills-launched/

f) Bangladesh Women in Technology (BWIT)

BWIT is mainly a forum consisting of women entrepreneurs in ICT sector. The goal of this organization is to create a Forum where women in technology can be recognized and promoted; and to encourage young women to participate in the technology industry as professionals and entrepreneurs providing leadership.

According to their website, in celebrating “Girls in ICT Day 2015”, an initiative of International Telecommunication Union ITU Member States, BWIT held Online “Mobile Application Development Contest” for Girl students only. The Apps included social awareness element where ICT, was used in-

 Health  Security  Education  Career for Women and Girls.

Several groups participated in the contest and four of them were awarded at an event held on 23 April 2015 in celebration of Girls in ICT Day 2015.

The members of BWIT consist of 9 women entrepreneurs-

1. Luna Shamsuddoha, Dohatec 2. Shirin Huq, Information Services Network Ltd. 3. Farhana Rahman, UY systems 4. Kamrun Ahmed, eGeneration Ltd. 5. Rezwana Khan, Star Computer Systems

6. Tauhida Haider Reema, Global Web Outsourcing 7. Laura Bonapace-Chaudhury, Bonapace Associates 8. Nazneen Kamal, Anupam Infotek 9. Nazma Kader, Computer Jagat

56 faculties of professionals from Computer Science background are also with BWIT.

News Links:

http://www.thedailystar.net/city/8-female-students-get-awards-developing- mobile-apps-79050# The Independent's feature on Gils in ICT Day http://techshohor.com/news/35912 Prothom Alo's feature on Gils in ICT Day

Part-4 | Local and Regional Apps Competitions

i. National Hackathon 2014 j. National Mobile Application Award and Developer Conference 2015 k. National Award 2014 l. EATL-Prothom Alo Apps contest 2015 m. BWIT Mobile Application Development Contest n. Nasa Space Apps Contest o. Firefox App Challenge Bangladesh 2014

p. Mbillionth Award South Asia

a) National Hackathon 2014

The “National Mobile Hackathon” was featured social-public related issues as problem statement and ask the participants to innovate new solutions to solve the problems. It was the biggest of its kind in Bangladesh so far.

Organizer: ICT Division of Bangladesh government. besides MCC Ltd, A2i BASIS, Symphony, Grameenphone, Robi, Sol Quest, Google Developer Group, Better Stories, BD Ventures Ltd, HiFi Public, Social Geeky Advantage was partners of this event.

Date: Started December 06, 2014 morning and concluded December 07, 2014 night.

Venue: Bangabandhu International Conference Hall, Dhaka.

Participants:

Participants was Bangladeshi national, specially university students and professional developers by forming teams of 5 participants each. A team with developers and designers. Team leaders were responsible for all team communications. So far 1,700 programmers, freelancers, students and app developers, who will be divided into 340 teams, have registered to participate in the contest. A total of 1,675 young developers, freelancers, students and mobile application developers participated in the event, divided into 288 teams, each containing five members- both coders and designers. The participants worked on Android, IOS and Firefox OS platforms to build the solutions.

There are 49 professional companies who will also take part. 30 veteran IT specialists and programmers evaluated the projects.

Guiding:

A pool of 40 top notch tech mentors was to guide the teams. Country’s best tech entrepreneurs, experts, developers are designers were in the role of mentors to help out the participants to achieve their targets. Mentors start working with teams via email even before the main event.

Finding Solutions:

The participants were asked to find mobile-based solutions to question paper leakage, corruption, sexual harassment, traffic jam, security on the highways, sanitation, water transport safety, cyclone centre management, reproductive health, and personal health problems.

After 36 hours of programming, mobile applications found solutions to 10 social and national problems at the National Mobile Hackathon. The most popular problem at the Hackathon was traffic jam, 40 teams worked on this problem alone.

Winners:

Traffic Jam Solution: Team Name- GravityBD, Team Members- Mr. Arman Ahmed, Bishwajit Pandey, Bappy Dautta, Rashidul Hasan, University- AUST, App features- searching traffic in real time, login via social media, pickup request etc.

Road Safety: Team Name- Mobio Men, Team Members- Abid Hasan Shaon, Sharif-Ul-Islam, University.Organization: MobioApp Limited, App features- SOS option for emergency help, blackspot option, accident report submission by users etc.

Cyclone Center Management: Team Name- UIU Ambassadors, Team Members- Partha Pratim Sutradhar, Namul Ahsan, Mahmud Rashid, Tashfiqul Bari, University- UIU, App features- Cyclone Center Management, Condition update, relief priority basis on effected people information by weight management.

Sexual & Reproductive Health: Team Name- Buddies_Dream, Team Members- Anamul Hasan, Mahmudul Hasan, Amin Rayzan, Sheikh Torikul Alam, Faisal

Ahmed, University- UITS, App features- Sexual and reproductive health rights, video support, online doctor contact list.

Sanitation: Team Name- Cosmuter, Team Members- Md. Saidul, Imran Hossain, Parag Das, University- Port City International University, App Features- Awareness of Non Communicable Diseases, Automated checking system, Emergency Button.

Non Communicable Diseases: Team Name- BRACU_HENNK, Team Members- Nahid Kamal, Sayed Erfan Arefin, Shanewas Ahmed, Koushik Jay, Tasnia Ashrafi Heya, University- BRAC University, App Features- symptoms input, app will calculate particular diseases, search options, track damages, online doctor suggestions.

Sexual Harassment: Team Name- RITL Daak, Team Member- Rupom IT, App Feature- Sexual Harassment apps.

Corruption: Team- TrillionPixel, Team Member- Shehabul Hossain Sunny, Tahsin Alam Tamim, Maroof Ur Rahman, University- BRAC University, App Features- Citizen can raise their voice, record audio conversation of corruption, automatic store in server, Geo tagging option etc.

Water Transportation Security: Team- Brain Station 23, App Name- BS-WTS, Team Members- Atish Kumar Dipangkar, MD Zakaria, Md. Ashraful Islam, Kazi Faisal Arefin Ovi, App Features- App can broadcast current situation, fitness condition, regular weather update, map update option.

Question Paper Leak: Team Name- Team Trimatrik, Team Members- Mehedi Hassan Bappy, Fuad Syed, Khan Yasir, Mir Ashraf Ali Ronok, App Name- Guard, App Features- App only for exam invigilator, candidate verification option, smart tracking, Hall status update, and Device Detection option

Awards:

The champions of this competition were handsomely rewarded. They received Tk.20 Lakhs of innovation fund to materialize their proposed app.

Competition url: http://www.nationalappsbd.com/?page_id=1893

b) National Mobile Application Award 2014

The competition was organized by the ICT Division of Ministry of Post & Telecommunication of Bangladesh in collaboration with World Summit Award. NMA Award’14 was an initiative to select and promote the Bangladeshi best in mobile content and innovative applications. Its aims was to make the benefits of the new Information Society accessible and meaningful for all humanity, and in particular, to raise public awareness and give deserved public recognition to the highest quality mobile application based initiative. The submissions were evaluated by National Grand Jury, who selected the 8 winners. All winners from this National Contest will be nominated for World Summit Award 2015 to take part in the WSA-mobile global contest.

Computer Programming Contest: Only for Girls

Munir Hasan General Secretary, BDOSN.

Though there are no separate projects of mobile app training for girls, but now something special is going to happen through the programming contest. The ICT department and the Bangladesh open source Network (BDOSN) is going to th organize the competition at 13 December 2015. A pre-contest of online programming will be held at December 12.

Our interest is in the hardcore programming for girls only. Our target is 3,000 female programmers will participate. But now it seems that it will exceed seven thousands. Forty thousand students is studying computer science every year in our country. Only seven percent is interested in programming. The girls’ participation rate is very alarming though. We would like to come out from this critical situation. Girls are interested in programming also, for this reason we want to arrange this competition only for girls.

I believe by this arrangement we would be able to attract girls on programming and will make the percentage plus from minus.

There is no way left for us except programming. Within the year of 2020 United States will be in need of 1 million programmers and Europe will need 900 thousand programmers. Bangladesh will also be in need of one hundred and twenty thousand programmers. If we do not get prepare in-time, we have to hire programmers from outside the country instead of exporting them as manpower.

Evaluation Criteria

The averaged sum of these five criteria is calculated as the technical score and used for ranking in the evaluation process.

– Quality of content and comprehensiveness

– Ease of use on the small screen: navigation and orientation

– Quality of design: aesthetic value of graphics / music or sounds

– Range of functionalities

– Technical quality: performance, craftsmanship, stability

Winners:

Srl No Category Winner Runners Up

1. Business & Commerce Selliscope byHumac Finance bdRaquib ul Lab Limited Alam (BUET)

2. Government & Farmer Query Universal Meter Participation System by mPower Reader App by Shurjo Enterprises Ltd. Mukhi Ltd

3. Environment & Health CriticaLink by Live Blood Bank by CriticaLink Ezze Technology

4. Learning & Education Durbin by Durbin Math Parking by Labs Team Creative

5. Tourism & Culture Hajj Wizard by Bus Map Dhaka by Team Omelet Nerd CatsBangladesh Flight Live by SmartDroid (Fida

Chowdhury)

6. Entertainment & Lifestyle Tap Tap Ants: Boipoka by Battlefield by Rise MobioApp Ltd Up Labs

7. Media & News Desh IP TV by Hak Japan Tech & Trading Pte Ltd (BD Office: Planet Networks Limited)

c) National Mobile Application Award and Developer Conference 2015

This award was for the best Bangladeshi Mobile content and creative developers. On 18th Aprill 2015, the award was given in the ceremony named `National Mobile Application Award and developer conference 2015’. It was held on Khamarbari Krishibid Institute conference room. It was organized by ICT division of Bangladesh Government.

Platforms:

Smart Phone, Blackberry, Tablet, I-pad, Android, ios, windows.

Awards:

In a grand ceremony of thousands of developers of the country, a total of 10,50,000 taka in awards and special honorary crest were awarded.

Winners:

Champions and runners-ups of total 7 categories were awarded at the ceremony. In Business category, ‘Seliscope’ app by Humac Lab Limited became champion while BUET student RakibUnAlam was runners-up for his ‘Finance BD’ app. On the topic government and people partnership, Empower Enterprise Limited became champion for their ‘Farmer Quary’ app. ‘Universal Meter Reader’ app by Surjomukhi Limited won runners-up prize. The app ‘Critical Linkk’ by Critical Link won the championship in environment and health category while ‘Live Blood

Bank’ app by Easy Technology was runners-up. In education and training category, ‘Durdin’ app by Durbin Lab won the championship and ‘Math Parking’ by Team Creative won the runners-up prize.

The ceremony was presented by Ashraf Abir, CEO of the event organizer MCC Limited while the awards were handed over by prominent personalities in their respective sectors.

d) EATL-Prothom Alo Apps Contest - 2015

The largest mobile apps development contest of Bangladesh "EATL-Prothom Alo Apps Contest - 2015" was officially launched for the third time. The launching ceremony was held on 14th September, 2014 at Hotel Sonargoan, Dhaka.

This is the largest mobile apps development contest in Bangladesh mainly focused on innovative ideas. It is a Nine Month Youth Engagement program. The top 3 teams will have to prove their competency in different levels of app development throughout the competition who will be awarded BDT 10 lac, BDT 5 lac and BDT 2 lac, respectively. Top 10 teams will be awarded smartphones along with job opportunities in EATL.

This year the contest has been organized to be bigger than past two contests. Newer sessions and preparations have been included to make the contest more interesting and meaningful. The contest will begin with campus activations and concept note submissions. More campus activations and awareness programs will be conducted this year. The main part of the contest will begin with the submission of concept notes. The grand finale tool place on March 28, 2015.

Award Category

 Best App - Individual/Team with a cash prize of BDT 10,00,000  2nd Best App - Individual/Team with a cash prize of BDT 500,000  3rd Best App - Individual/Team with a cash prize of BDT 200,000  10 smart phones for top 10 Individuals/Teams  Job opportunity for top 10 Participants/Team

Among thousands of ideas top 25 was selected on July, 2015

The Top 25 apps are given below: (According to concept ID) 31st July 2015

ID Concept Title Category Team Name

20 BD-tourist Travel & Tourism Otomies

59 Money Calculator Business +Finance Break

79 Home Remedies(BD) Health IHAI

113 Chemical Simulator Education SlingShots

144 Mobile Krishi (mKRISHI) Agriculture Hawk_eye

229 Collective Farming Agriculture Gremlin

289 Connect and collaborate Lifestyle SparkingBULB

361 INFERNAL CRUSADE! Games Antiviral Studios

Vikings 369 Safety Ensured Tools Reincarnated

408 Prathomik Shikkha Education Android Developers

444 Dual SIM Cost Management Tools BUET Polestar

NATA 457 Talking Eye Games ENTERTAINMENT

NATA 484 Fingo Games ENTERTAINMENT

498 Burst Your Enemy Games The A Solders

Bikalpo Pusti- (Alternative 554 Health The Hephaestus Nutrition)

558 Rough Khata Education DigiTeam

577 Child Vaccine Health Team Smile

655 Ricsaw Games Asgardian

669 Instant Class Manager Education IUT_Integrity

672 CATCH THE HINT Games Durbin

676 Exploring Bangladesh Travel & Tourism Team 'JHOR'

686 CANDY BLUSTER Games Durbin

689 Dr Hulu's Lab Games Angry Coders

709 Class attendance using WIFI Education Team Alpha

715 Chalk Business +Finance C6

*** The Grand Finale will be held on coming year, 2016.

e) BWIT Mobile Application Development Contest

In celebrating “Girls in ICT Day 2015”, an initiative of International Telecommunication Union ITU Member States. BWIT held Online “Mobile Application Development Contest” for Girl students only. The Apps included social awareness element where ICT, was used in

 Health  Security  Education  Career for Women and Girls.

Several groups participated in the contest and four of them were awarded at an event held on 23 April 2015 in celebration of Girls in ICT Day 2015 and all groups were presented with Certificate of appreciation for enthusiastic participation.

Mobile Apps contest was for Girl students on Social awareness element where ICT

can be used in Health, Security, Education, Career” for Women and Girls. There was remarkable response and most interesting concept were presented by girls from different Universities. The goal of the Contest was to promote women in technology by inspiring girls to see themselves not just as users of technology, but as inventors, designers, builders, and entrepreneurs in the technology industry. BWIT held an Mobile Apps contest for Girl students on Social awareness element where ICT can be used in Health, Security, Education, Career” for Women and Girls. There was remarkable response and most interesting concept were presented by girls from different Universities. The goal of the Contest was to promote women in technology by inspiring girls to see themselves not just as users of technology, but as inventors, designers, builders, and entrepreneurs in the technology industry.

Team Kitkat, students of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology won the Contest for an App social awareness and platform for ease of doing business for women entrepreneurs. Students from Dhaka University Computer Science Department, UITS, Khulna University and other Institution participate in the Contest.

For a century and a half since 1865, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has been at the centre of advances in communications – from telegraphy through to the modern world of satellites, mobile phones and the Internet. BTRC, Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications , Government of the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is member organization.

Want to start Hackathon for girls

Samira Juberi Himika, Managing Director, Team Engine & Director, BASIS Women forum.

We have female coders, but not programmer. The gap needs to be filled up. If this gap is mitigated, programmers could do work professionally at any organization rather than work in private. This will surely alleviate the scarcity of programmers.

500 apps have been developed by the government initiated project. But as we can see that, may be only 2 apps has been developed by women, and it is very frustrating. The participation of women in technology is quite low. Those who studied computer science they got training in general software. From them, we can hardly get 13 out of 100 as IT professional. May be one of them is shown interest to work with apps. To resolve such situation, we are going to organize a HACKATHON on International women's Day (8th March) by BASIS women Forum. Girls will lead this program. We will propose them to develop apps to solve the problem which they face regularly on their very own life. By this method several new app may come forward. This program is now at a discussion level.

Women can be empowered by app. By developing app and by using it women can feel them as empowered. She has to have a smart phone and the facilities of using numerous apps. So she can find solution on her own and can communicate easily. She will not seek others’ help. When the solution lies at one's own grip, then nobody is more powerful than her.

The 'Maya Apa’ app is made by just two girls. They developed it for the solutions of the problems that women face. This app is giving them consultancy and creating awareness. Brac has promoted it. This is such a big canvas.

Here has both problem and possibilities. Problem is to make girls understand the business model. They have to understand that software and App is different issue. Software has local market in some cases International too. But app is totally global. Anybody can use it by downloading from any part of the world. For this language proficiency is also important. Many of them do not understand this. If it is properly understood, they will do better in this sector. 67

f) Nasa Space Apps Contest

Bangladesh participates in NASA’s ‘International Space Apps Challenge 2014.’ A team from Mobioapp, a sister concern of Datasoft Systems Bangladesh Ltd, took part in this international competition.

The eight member team created five applications in the allotted 48 hours between 18th and 19th April, at the end of which they submitted their work online. All five applications were nominated for the competition. Teams from 95 cities around the world worked simultaneously and submitted their work for this event while individuals not listed in these cities could also take part in this competition through the internet. A total of 671 apps were developed by 8, 195 contestants. There are five criteria in this competition which are, Earth Watch, Technology In Space, Human Space Flight, Robotics and Asteroids.

The members in the Mobioapp team are Imtiaz Hossain, Hasanur Rahman, Fazly Rabbi, Fahim Ahmed, Fida Muntasir, Md. Sharif Ul Islam, Mamunul Mazid and Rubaiyat Alam. The five apps developed by this team are, Earth Geek, Land Slide 360, Your World From Space, Artistic Earth, and Sky Environment.

Earth Geek is quiz related app. Satellite images of different parts of the world will be shown and the user would have to name these places.

Land Slide 360 will show if there are any chances of a landslide anywhere on earth. However information from various sources will need to be gathered for this app.

Your World From Space will showcase different pictures of earth taken from outer space. These pictures can be ‘liked’ and ‘shared.’

Artistic Earth is an app similar to Your World From Space but the pictures here will be placed in different categories.

Sky Environment is an app where you can take pictures of the sky from anywhere on earth and upload them. The 10 most recent pictures will be displayed on the main page of the app.

g) Firefox App Challenge Bangladesh 2014

The “Firefox App Challenge” was a competition open to any developer or company and one can participate by submitting a Firefox OS App to the Firefox Marketplace. To participate, one needs to complete the registration process on website www.firefoxappchallenge.com; From these registrants 100 participants get a two days Training in Firefox OS. Only the residents of Bangladesh were eligible for the competition.

Each category has its champion and runner up. Additional five prizes were given to the apps which were judged as 'Outstanding Innovation' regardless of the category. Participants were allowed to submit their applications in 5 (five) different categories:

1. Services- Social, Public, Government 2. Entertainment 3. Games 4. News & Media 5. Tools & Utility

5 (five) special trainings was provided to 100 lucky registrants of the app challenge, where they get training on Firefox OS. Three (3) trainings was conducted by MCC Ltd, two (2) and 1 App Das was conducted by Mozilla Community, Bangladesh.

The contest starts on October 22, 2014 and concluded on December 14, 2014. The last date for submission applications was fixed on December 4, 2014.

According to organisers, a consolidated amount of $27,500 was given as prize money while two prizes was given under each categories, first prize was $3,000 and runner-up $1,500.

Apart from that, there was five prizes of $1,000 for the developers, who illustrate outstanding innovation or value, regardless of categories through their developed applications. Winners get a chance to visit the Mozilla headquarterslocated in San Francisco, California, USA.

Jan Jongboom, Firefox OS Grand Master along with his team of jury evaluated the applications and selected the winners of the Firefox App Challenge. Firefox OS App challenge Gala event held on 13th January, 2015 at Grameenphone Head Office hosted by Mozilla, Grameenphone and MCC.

Winners

Within fifteen winning teams, three of the participants named Anik Islam Avik, Md. Anisur Rahman and Salman Rahman Desh from American International University-Bangladesh (AIUB). Md. Anisur Rahman and Salman Rahman Desh also actively contributing to Mozilla and member of Mozilla Bangladesh. Anik Islam Avik with his Team Omlete of three members were awarded as 1st Prize in "Tools & Utility" category by making the My Salat app. The other two members of his team were Mofijul Islam from Dhaka University and Towhidul Islam from Northern University. The app mainly provides a details timings of all prayers time for Muslims. Besides it has some great features like Tasbih, nearby mosque locations, auto- silent mode if the device is near a mosque and so on.

Md. Anisur Rahman and Salman Rahman Desh as a team called TwinFox were awarded as outstanding innovation prize in 'Games' category by making a game familiar as Tappy. This is a brain teasing game to test the concentrate level of a user. User taps on different types of color circles to earn points where some circles let them get points and bonus and some deducts.

Md. Anisur Rahman again also awarded individually as outstanding innovation prize in news and media category by making the National ID Bangladesh app.

h) Mbillionth Award South Asia

The mBillionth Award South Asia is given annually since 2010 for innovations in mobile communications in South Asia. Its stated mission is "to recognize and honor excellence in mobile communications across South Asia... recognizing and felicitating mobile innovations, applications and content services delivery.

Organizer:

India (New Delhi)-based non-profit Digital Empowerment Foundation (DEF).

The award is open to governments, individuals, private sector companies, academic institutions, and NGOs in any of the eight SAARC countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Entry is by self-nomination.

Nominations for the award are pre-filtered and the final selection is carried out by a Grand Jury. In 2014 the Grand Jury consisted of 15 members and considered 126 nominations. There were 24 winners and 6 Special Mentions.

Bangladeshi Winners of the mBillionth award in 2014 :

Category Company

Business and commerce / SWOSTI Limited banking

Agriculture and ecology Farmer Query System

App can open a whole new world for them

Eashika Naznin Software Engineer, Ergoventures Ltd House : 8, Level # 3, Road : 14(New) 29(Old) Dhanmondi R/A, Dhaka-1209 Phone: +88(02)8122883, Cell: 01914-101143 [email protected]

Q: Do you think app development can bring a huge change in the current situation of woman empowerment?

Eashika Naznin: Apps are just not a fluke in the ocean of technology. It directly related to our daily living and needs also. So, apps can be life-changing instrument. But it has a strong pre-requisite, that is ‘Idea’. Women must have to make ideas on their own to find the problem and solution. One more thing- apps are not subject to independent learning. One has to gain sufficient knowledge in programming to gain know-how of apps. Training on mobile apps requires the basic knowledge in coding with JAVA or other languages. So, if we think this mobile app training is really going to bring lots of changes in the life of Bangladeshi women, first we have to focus on basic ICT training for them.

Q: Is there any gender based challenge that women have to face to become a mobile app developer?

Eashika Naznin: There is no particular challenge on apps perspective. now-a-days in ICT sector there is no gender issue. Both male and females are treated equally by the government’s initiative. In case of employment, I do not see any particular reason to believe that companies have particular interest on hiring male programmer or vice versa.

Q: What are the prospects of women app developers of Bangladesh?

Eashika Naznin: Yes, a lot of. Here in BD, most of the rural educated women seem not so outgoing in nature, or not having opportunities to do job far outside from her home; app can open a whole new world for them.

Q: What are the key obstacles for the women of Bangladesh in developing their career in ICT, especially in app development?

Eashika Naznin: Currently there are not so many hindrances in this segment regarding gender issue, as the people of this country is now more concerned about the need for technical education of the girls. But, in rural settings some people still thinks that technological education are not for the girls. Hence, app development requires versatile knowledge in ICT, therefore some extra efforts also needed. 74

Part-5 | Locally Developed Apps Concerning Sustainable Development and Apps for the People with Disability

5.1 Locally Developed Apps

 Bangladesh Constitution  Maa O Shishu  Pusti Kotha  Maya Apa  RTIA Bangladesh  Agriculture Info Service  Village Court  Government Services  Green Life  Breast Screening  Bkash Flexi  Momota  E- Joyeeta  Bangla Boipoka

This list is far from comprehensive, because there are several other locally developed Mobile Applications that cut across all areas of human endeavor and interaction.

a) Bangladesh Constitution

Bangladesh Constitution app in Bangla, provides an easily searchable and readable format which contains all essential concepts for the citizens. It enriches lack of knowledge of the nation's laws on the part of the citizenry. The app ensures all Bangladeshi’s to have a working knowledge of the constitution by providing an easily accessible version of the document for mobile phones.

Screenshots of Bangladesh Constitution App

It ensures that a majority of the country's citizens know the constitution. we can begin to intelligently hold our leaders accountable for the provision of our

constitutional rights. It provides the legal foundation for the existence of Bangladesh, sets out the rights and duties of its citizens, and defines the structure of the government and many more. link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mcc.bdconst additional info:

Updated: September 15, 2015

Size: 2.5M

Installs: 100,000 - 500,000

Current Version: 1.0.6

Requires Android 2.3 and up

Content Rating: Rated for 3+

Offered By : MCC LTD.

Developer website: http://mcc.com.bd/ email: [email protected]

b) Maa O Shisu This application provides information about how can we take care of pregnant mother and new born baby in Bengali.

link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.eatl.thousanddays

Additional information

Updated: July 25, 2015

Size: 4.6M

Installs: 1,000 - 5,000

Current Version: 4.0

Requires Android: 2.2 and up

Content Rating: Rated for 3+

Offered By : Bangladesh ICTD Apps

Developer : http://www.national500apps.com&

Email [email protected]

c) Maya Apa The Maya Apa mobile app is made by the team behind Maya.com.bd, the first comprehensive website (with app) in Bangladesh dedicated to women’s health and well-being. This app is made with a team mostly consist of female members. The lead software engineer of Maya Apa is also a woman. Her name is Shubrami Moutushy Mou.

Whether its exchanging knowledge between peers or receiving expert advice from specialists, Maya Apa aims to connect women with the information they are looking for. Maya’s high quality medical and social content along with online health and legal advice service, Maya Apa, has fast become a viable and reliable source of information and a highly trusted platform for many.

Through a partnership with BRAC, Maya can drive greater outreach to women at the grassroots, giving them an opportunity to access a wide range of information and peer-to- peer support, to make informed decisions for their own lives and families.

The Maya team is made up of like-minded women and men, with a view to use internet and mobile technology to make a difference in Bangladesh. www.maya.com.bd

Source: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.maya.mayaapaapp

features:

1. Redesigned the app following Material design.

2. Overall performance enhancement of the app

3. Added new features:

d) Ability to add voice questions e) Re-ask a question f) Rate Answers g) Added more filters to search h) Added search for content within the app. 4. Added FAQ, Disclaimer.

5. "Ask" questions and Notification experience has been improved.

Additional information

Updated: November 11, 2015

Size: Varies with device

Installs: 10,000 - 50,000

Content Rating: Rated for 3+

Offered By : Mayalogy Ltd

Developer website: Visit website

Email [email protected] Privacy Policy

d) RITA-Bangladesh The RTIA BD has been developed with a view to make the Right to Information Act (RTIA) 2009 of Bangladesh digitally readable on any Android devices. Now you can access the RTIA 2009 anywhere by your mobile.

The official statement of the RTI (Right to Information) Act-2009 is to make provisions for ensuring free flow of information and the people's RTI. Right to Information Act allow individuals and groups to understand the policies and activities of the government as a sign of the growing recognition of the importance of the citizen's access to information for strengthening democracy, promoting human rights and good governance.

The RTI Act has 8 chapters and 37 articles. The Article 7 under Section 2 provides the list of exemptions in regard to releasing information and which is mostly in line with the Article 39 (2) of the constitution of Bangladesh.

This application has been developed primarily for the Bangladeshi Citizens and other stakeholders. The App brings RTIA 2009 in Chapters and Sections. The interactive navigation will help your information surfing handy. A set of FAQ has also included for better understanding of everybody.

Key Features:

-The RTIA 2009

-8 chapters and 37 articles

-Language : Bangla and English

-Support Pinch and Tap Zoom

-Clean and Concise Presentation

-Aesthetic Reading Experience

-Ergonomic Navigation

-Efficient in Memory Usage

links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.divineit.rtia

Offered By : Divine IT Ltd

Developer web site: Visit website

Email: [email protected]

e) Pusti Kotha This application provides information about different types of fruit and vegetables & its nutritional values in Bangladesh.

It will provide the instruction, how one person can keep his or her body fit? Moreover, it also provides information on daily needs that required to be fit like; how much calories are required for a fit person?, fruits and its nutritional values and Impact of fruits and its nutritional values for preventing of different disease and so on. Moreover, you will also get information what amount of nutrition is needed respect to your ages or height? It explains on the causes of malnutrition and description of different diseases due to malnutrition in Bangladesh.

links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.eatl.pustikotha

Additional information

Updated: November 5, 2014

Size: 2.6M

Installs: 10,000 - 50,000

Current Version: 1.2

Requires: Android 2.2 and up

Offered By : National Apps Bangladesh

Developer : http://www.nationalappsbd.com

Email: [email protected]

f) Agriculture Info Service Agriculture Information Service, under the Ministry of Agriculture, provides information to the mass on technology advancements for enhanced development. Using the application, one can get detailed information on how to plan for a profitable agro-based product such as crop cultivation, fisheries and livestock. Furthermore, one can also get to know about the implementation methodology, management and maintenance of the agro-based products.

links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mcc.ais

Additional information

Updated: January 25, 2015

Size: 2.9M

Installs: 1,000 - 5,000

Current Version: 1.0.0

Requires: Android 2.2 and up

Offered By : National Apps Bangladesh

Developer website: http://www.nationalappsbd.com email: [email protected]

g) Village Court Village court has been established on 1976 to empower women, the poor and disadvantaged groups to seek remedies for injustices, and to enable justice institutions to be responsive to claims. Now a days citizens are resolving their disputes at the local level in an expeditious, transparent and affordable manner through well-functioning village court. This application provides information about village court development process, claim process, laws, punishment law and fees.

links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mcc.gram_adalat

Additional information

Updated: January 31, 2015

Size: 2.0M

Installs: 1,000 - 5,000

Current Version: 1.0.1

Requires: Android 2.2 and up

Offered By : National Apps Bangladesh

Developer website: http://www.nationalappsbd.com email: [email protected]

h) Government Services The overall objective of the project is to provide support in building a digital nation through delivering services at the citizen’s doorsteps. By this application, user can acquire various government services (Such: Agriculture, Fisheries & Livestock, Communication, Engineering, Allowances, government loan, Habitation etc.) taking process, important documents, rules, regulations and service officials for the specific service. This information can get searching by service name or code number.

links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mcc.governmentservices

Offered By : National Apps Bangladesh

Developer website: http://www.nationalappsbd.com email: [email protected]

i) Green Life How can maintain the nutrition values of your daily meal to lead healthy life? How could I get free from any mental stress? To get those answers with effective suggestions use this app.

Fattest among your friends, tensed about your bloated tummy, depressed about your weight, want to adopt a healthy lifestyle, confused about your eating habits or tensed about your dull and sagging skin?

Tips on – Local nutritional foods, Fruit and related calories, obesity, junk foods, health care, skin, care, weight loss, heart disease, blood pressure, kidney problem, diabetic, hair tips, prevent hair loss tips. You will get to know about causes, prevention and cure procedure of mentioned diseases.

This app is one stop solution for all these problems. Simply install this Green Life app and get solution to all your queries.

Updated: October 24, 2014

Size: 1.3M

Installs: 500 - 1,000

Current Version: 1.1

Requires Android: 2.2 and up

Offered By : National Apps Bangladesh

Developer website: http://www.nationalappsbd.com email: [email protected]

j) Breast Screening

Nowadays breast tumor and cancer are very common problem of married or unmarried women. Due to shame women are not willing to share problem with other. Here is the perfect solution of those women. Just install this application on your mobile phone get video or textual instruction for screening you breast to be confirm about any problem.

This application presents step by step process to screen breast to be confirmed about any problem. Moreover, user will get specialized hospital list with contract details for getting treatment or urgent suggestion from anywhere and anytime by dialing directly to the given numbers. All kinds of Information regarding breast related problems are just one click away from you. So download & install now and use it to become safe… links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.eatl.breastscreening

Offered By : National Apps Bangladesh

Developer website: http://www.nationalappsbd.com email: [email protected]

k) Bkash Flexi

With Bkash Flexi application now you can Flexiload/Recharge any Bangladeshi mobile, Send bKash, DBBL Mobile Banking, Branded SMS and many more. Our endless payment options and seamlessly secure transactions, you are bound to have an incredible mobile recharge experience.

What We Offer:

• Quick & easy mobile recharge, landline & utility bill payments on the go.

• Mobile recharges for all Bangladeshi operators such as Grameenphone, Airtel, Robi, Banglalink, Citycell & Teletalk.

• Transfer money to almost all Bangladeshi mobile banking provider. e.g. bKash, DBBL, MCash, UCash & more.

• Bill Payments for Desko, Wasa, Qubee, Banglalink, Ollo & more. • Buy Prepaid card instantly for all operators.

• Send Branded SMS with white level masking.

• Create account take less 1 minute.

• Add fund to your wallet instantly using bKash, Paypal, Visa/Master Debit/Credit Card. • Live support & 24x7 Customer Care.

links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ezzeload.ezzetech.com.bkashflexi

Offered By : Ezze Technology Ltd.

Developer website: http://www.ezzetech.com email: [email protected] address: House 41, Road 08, Block E, Banasree, Dhaka-1219.

l) Momota This application provides information about how can we take care of pregnant mother and new born baby for reducing the death rate in Bangladesh. User will get more about problems of teen age girls, details about birth control procedure. After getting marry do registration with name and age. You will get all kind of information regarding pregnancy control in audio and video format. Moreover this application also incorporated with pregnancy calculator. Pregnancy calculator estimates due date by last menstrual period. You can add very cute Widget to track your weeks and days progress. Take a picture of yourself each week.

- Days, weeks and months to go and which have passed

- Estimated day of the week

- Estimated season

- Current trimester

- Get daily notification

Along with that new mother will get valuable information about child care in audio and video format. links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.eatl.momota

Offered By : National Apps Bangladesh

Developer website: http://www.nationalappsbd.com email: [email protected]

m) E- Joyeeta

The ministry of Women and children of Government of People’s Republic of Bangladesh has been working towards implantation of various programs involving establishing empowerment, general rights of the women and children and overall mainstream development. A shopping centre named joyeeta has been established in Rapa Plaza, Dhanmondi, Dhaka to bring this project alive. About 16 thousand voluntary women in the whole country, under the Women Association Bureau, will be supported to market and selling their handmade produced commodities. In this application, Joyeeta will be displayed with detailed information. Buyers will be able to browse the commodities in a list of category. From this list, after selecting merchandise, its name, usefulness and prices all will be available.

links: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mcc.joyeeta

n) Bangla Boipoka

Launched in July, 2013 Boipoka (in English this means Bookworm) is a mobile application for android and iOS platforms. It is the largest Bangla e-book market place in the world. Boipoka strictly maintains copyright of publishers and authors by its own developed DRM (Digital Rights Management) system. Books can be bought through In-app purchase, bkash (a mobile app for financial transactions) and activation code.

The key features of the mobile app are:

 Large collection of e-books  Purchase of popular books available in the book store using Credit cards and bKash  Facilty to share favourite lines of any book in social media  Facility to rate the book you read  Feedback facility  Facility for text highlight, bookmark, annotation, page jump, night reading  Facility to search for Books  Facility to read other PDF files on your device

 Lots of free books are also available  No Advertisements

Boipoka is promoting protection of intellectual property of authors and publishers for electronic version for the first time in the history of Bangla book publication by mobile application.

The app can be downloaded for free from Google Play Store or i-tunes App-store.

link : https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mobioapp.paidpdf

Developer : MobioApp Ltd emails : [email protected]

LANGUAGE : Bangla and English

WEBSITE : www.banglabookhouse.com

5.2 Apps for the Disables (Made in Bangladesh) a) Shobdo The main objective of this system is to help the mute or those who have speaking disabilities to have the freedom to speak. Description: In this world there are a huge number of peoples who have inability to speak. About 8 out of 10,000 people cannot speak. But this small application allows them to speak.

Additional information

Updated: March 23, 2013

Size : 0.63MB

Current Version : 1.0

Requires Android : 2.3 and up

Average Rating : 3.60

b) Old Care Home

Want to know about the day care, old care center and their available facilities in different parts in Bangladesh. Use this app and get details information with contact address on Google Map. User could select the type of center like day care or old home for searching firstly then user will get list of that particular type of center. After selecting one from the list user will get details about it.

Additional information

Updated : September 10, 2014

Size : 7.69MB

Current Version : 1

Requires Android : 2.3 and up

c) Talking Eyes Empowering visually impaired to play games on mobile phones

Developer: Dipankar Talukder, Student of American International University,

Dhaka. Talking Eyes is a mobile app that helps blind and visually impaired people to play various mobile games. At present there is no such app in the market. The target users are: people all over the world who are blind or visually impaired or have poor vision. All users need is a mobile phone that has touch screen, good

sound system and android operating system. At present it is available only in English language but a Bengali version is under development.

The app divides the mobile screen into 3 buttons. The upper one is for Yes or Play Type option. The middle one is for Introduction or Game selecting or Download option and the lower button is for other options like Quit or Main Manu option. Each button has own audio engine with instructions. The app has three major components – the WR or warning detector, the LR or logic robot and the AE or audio engine.

When a blind man plays any game, the warning detector detects situations and sends information to the logic robot which gives proper tips to the audio engine. Finally, the audio engine provides the right action instructions in audio format to the blind man like press right, press up, press in the middle etc.

The key features and advantages of the app are:

 Blind people can play games  The app has in-built proper instructions  Does not require help of other people  Fresh Audio Engine Instructions  Smart In-game suggestions  Scoring and level system  So far tested on popular games such as DX-ball, Ping Pong etc. New games will be updated once in a month.

The Beta version was ready in February, 2015 and the app will be published commercially once it is ready for use across all platforms.

Part-6

Conclusion

Information and communication technology lies in the heart of any developing economy concerning information and knowledge. Developing ICT product, skilled people and increase involvement of male and female on an equal basis in ICT is important for economic development and societal implication. It is important to let women have equal share of societal status, influential jobs and high payment in all sector including ICT for adjusted development of an economy. Many limitations and drawbacks are hindering the women participation in ICT and app development sector of Bangladesh. But increasing initiatives and motivation from public and private sector for women through special facilities are increasing their interest in ICT sector. Digital technology specialists women plays vital role in family, nationally and even in global communities. This research found that gender ratios in ICT sector of Bangladesh is not standardized or harmonized with the global level but it agrees with the standard level of ICT sector, importance of women involvement and taking motivational initiatives and scheme to inspire women to get involve in ICT sector in large level. For taking pragmatic and practical initiatives both ICT and app developer companies and training institutes along with government and other public bodies should make strategic plan together. This informative research paper can be a datacenter for policymakers, trainers, academies and other related organizations to create a solid platform that will help women to get limitation less access to the ICT sector and app development of Bangladesh.

Recommendations

Bangladesh needs a lot more to develop the mobile app development. The youth has enthusiasm to attain their best; no training initiative seems to be un-occupied. Especially the rural girls have shown adequate interest in this field. But still there are lots more to do. After assessing the survey and observing the current situation and course curricula, we come to these key recommendations which are listed below-

1. Along with app development training, some extensive training on the trending programming languages (C++ Java) is also mandatory. 2. According to the criteria, MCC obtained highest marks to be collaborated with for extensive Youth mobile app training initiatives. The list followed by BITM, EATL and YPSA. 3. Before starting the mobile app development course, it is also necessary to re- assess the trainer’s updated capability of creating job or outsourcing opportunities for the young women app developers. 4. Before starting the Youth Mobile Initiative in Bangladesh, some extensive knowledge sharing and meeting among the relevant stakeholders is also required. Bangladesh government is always open to partnership for such development initiative.

The participants may include (not limited to)-

a) Ministry of ICT b) Officials from MCC, BASIS, BWIT, EATL as they are working with government on various projects regarding ICT training. MCC is conducting the app development training and BWIT is working as a forum and facilitator of app development for the young women. c) Spokesperson from app developing companies listed in this report. d) Journalists from ICT bit from some prominent media, as they got updates on a regular basis, e) Officials from Ministry of Education.

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f) The Youth Mobile initiative can be run nationwide, as there is a huge wave of tech-savvy young people can be found in rural Bangladesh, who are very eager to learn outsourcing. g) As Bangladesh Government started to think some extensive app training sessions for the young girls in the beginning of the next year, Youth mobile initiative can grab the chance to go along with the initial wave and will be able to achieve the maximum exposure at the right moment.

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Appendix- A Terms of Reference of Consultant/Organization

UNESCO’s YouthMobile Initiative

For Survey/Assessment of Training Providers in mobile application development in Bangladesh

The YouthMobile initiative empowers youth to resolve identified local issues of sustainable development and to reduce chronic youth unemployment through the sale of smart mobile applications, the formation of small businesses, and through acquisition of employability skills. The overarching objective is to have impacted at least 25,000 young people worldwide, particularly young women, with the skills to develop, promote, and sell at least 5,000 locally relevant mobile applications by 2017. The initiative builds on the experience of many worldwide projects that introduce young people to computer science programming (learning-to-code) and problem solving (coding-to-learn). It also seeks to show these young people that such computing power can be used for directly addressing their personal challenges or the problems faced by their local communities. Eventually groups of young people can create a business or demonstrate skills for applying to IT jobs in the local, national, or international market.

Within the framework of the UNESCO YouthMobile Initiative, the Contractor will undertake an individual assessment of existing initiatives in Bangladesh that offer

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training in mobile application development. The Contractor will report to the Programme Officer for Communication and Information in the UNESCO Dhaka Office and should deliver to UNESCO a final report prepared in the English language on or before [15 July, 2015]. The report will include an analysis of the findings and a comprehensive list of existing training initiatives in the country. The Contractor will focus on the following tasks and demands for UNESCO Dhaka Office:

1. Conduct a comprehensive survey of the national mobile trends, which should include (but not limited to) identifying key mobile manufacturers, operating systems, and service providers; disaggregated data that covers mobile demographics, age groups and gender; presence of locally developed apps; international and local mobile app stores; and relevant mobile coverage maps for the entire region through online research and phone/e-mail interviews with the organizers. The study can be mostly made up of bullet points and data maps, but must absolutely be from current (no earlier than one year unless describing historical trends) sources. Sources must be provided (footnote or endnote) and hyperlinked.

2. Conduct an extensive study/assessment of existing initiatives/trainings programmes for the young women in mobile apps development initiated by ICT Division (http://www.nationalappsbd.com/) under the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology of Bangladesh Government. The results will include full contact details of the training providers, number of beneficiaries (e.g. per year and per cohort), and possibly preliminary impact assessments (jobs, further education, etc.). The contractor/consultant should collect all Training curricula and sample training materials used in the training sessions.

3. Contact the Ministries/ICT Divisions of Information and Communication Technology Department of the Govt. Youth, those have existing related

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Government Programmes (including generic computer science programming) as well as their infrastructure/capability to host apps development training.

4. Provide an Appendix section that includes a profile of the Contractor, copy of the UNESCO YouthMobile Assessment Criteria, and any other relevant information in the report.

Deliverables

 Provide an Executive Summary that includes overview of report (ref: point 2) and outline relevant recommendation for future action.  Provide a Methodology section that details a step-by-step analysis on how the assessment was conducted. (ref: point 1 & 2)  Compile a comprehensive list of: a. National, regional, local and App Competitions or Challenges in the country b. Locally made apps with full profiles of the “top” selling, popular, and/or ones that address sustainable development c. Local apps made for or by Persons with Disabilities

The Contractor will submit a comprehensive Assessment Report 15 July 2015 and receive the once-only payment after submission of the final deliverable.

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Appendix- B List of App development institutes with training facilities

Sl. Name of the Address Email, Phone & Website Company 1 6/12 Humayun Road, [email protected] MCC Ltd. Block- B, Mohammadpur www.mcc.com.bd Dhaka-1207, Bangladesh

Tel:+88 02 8129193 2 House#9 (5th floor), [email protected] www.eatlbd.com Ethics Advanced Road#16, Gulshan-1, Technology Dhaka-1212, Limited (EATL) Phone: +88-02-8153220, +88-02-8153219. 3 5th floor (West), web: www.basis.org.bd , BITM (BASIS) BDBL(Old BSRS) Bhaban, email: [email protected] 12 Karwan Bazar, Dhaka Phone: 8151196, 8151197 4 Haji Shahab Uddin [email protected] Reverie Mansion H-84, New Corporation Airport Road, Banani, Limited Dhaka-1213 5 House # F10 (P), Road # http://ypsa.org 13, Block-B Chandgaon [email protected], [email protected] YPSA R/A, Chittagong- 4212, Bangladesh. Young Power in Social Action Tel: +88 031 672857, +88 031 2570915, Mobile: +88 01711-825068, +88 01819 321432,

6 House : 8, Level # 3, Road : [email protected] Ergo Ventures 14(New) 29(Old) http://www.ergo-ventures.com Limited Dhanmondi R/A, Dhaka- 1209 Phone: +88(02)8122883, 8110554, 9104721-5 Fax: +88-02-9118422 7 Basis Institute of BASIS Institute of Technology and Technology & Management Email : [email protected]

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Management (BITM) Web : www.bitm.org.bd/ BDBL Bhaban (3rd Floor - East), 12 Kawran Bazar, Dhaka -1215. Phone : +8809612342486

Forum/NGO working for Women in ICT 43 Purana Paltan Line [email protected], Bangladesh Women in Dhaka 1000 [email protected] Technology (BWIT) Bangladesh [email protected] www.bwit-bd.com +8801678625301

Phone: +880 2 836 3507, 934 8119 Fax: +880 2 956 9326 DNET Dnet, 4/8 Humayun Road, Block- [email protected] B, Mohammadpur, Dhaka-1207, Bangladesh Phone: +88 096060 http://dnet.org.bd 03638, +88 096060 16227, Fax: (+88 02) 8142021

Some App development Companies of Bangladesh 1 Droid Bangladesh 9th Floor, Building 7, Road 3 [email protected] Limited Mirpur 11, Dhaka 1216, [email protected] +8801537017968 http://droidbd.com/ 2 TopOfStack Software Mahfuza Tower (7th Floor), [email protected] 36/37 Probal Housing Adabor,Dhaka 1207 Bangladesh 3 POWER GP BD Address: Road:31, House:594, [email protected] Mirpur DOHS, Dhaka, Bangladesh 4 Algonyx House no: 6/5, Road no: 12, [email protected] Baitul Aman Housing Society, Adabor, Dhaka-1207 , Dhaka - 1207

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5 AnnaNovas Road # 12/A, House # 79, Flat [email protected] # 2B, Dhanmondi 1209, Bangladesh. 6 1st floor, 268, Sher-E-Bangla [email protected] Code and Fix Road Nirala, Khulna-9100 http://thecodeandfix.com Software Ltd Bangladesh 7 House # 10, Road # 04, Block [email protected] I drops Lab # A Banasree, Ramapura Dhaka – 1219 Bangladesh. 8 House 8 (ground floor), [email protected] JadeWits Road 3, A Block, Banasree, Technologies Rampura, Limited Dhaka 1219, Bangladesh 9 Narshinghapur, Zirabo, [email protected] HawarIT Ashulia, Dhaka. 10 BDBL Building, 9th Floor, 12 [email protected] iBacs Technologies Kawran Bazar C/A Dhaka - 1215 11 House #02,Road #19, Block [email protected] or Xprocoders Limited #B, Mirpur-10 [email protected]

Dhaka, Bangladesh. 12 Contact: Momtaz Plaza (4th [email protected] Creative IT Ltd floor) Opposite of Labaid https://www.creativeit-ltd.com Hospital) House#7, Road#4 Dhanmondi, Dhaka. 13 8th Floor, Plot#2, Bir Uttam [email protected] Brain Station 23 AK Khandakar Road, www.brainstation-23.com Mohakhali, Dhaka-1212 14 Kha-214/E,B.U.Rafiqul Islam [email protected] Techno MasPar Ave http://www.technomaspar.com International Progoti Tower(12-C),Merul Badda,Dhaka-+88- 01534899822 15 15, New Baily Road (Building [email protected] Astha IT Research # 2, First Floor) http://www.asthait.com and Consultancy PO: Santinagar, PS: Ramna Ltd. Dhaka, +88 01715596759

16 160 Lake Circus (3rd Floor) +880 2 9104351 Infoistic Mirpur Road, Dhanmondi +880 2 9104352 Dhaka - 1205, Bangladesh. +8801720211212 [email protected] http://infoistic.com/

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17 mhb monalee [email protected] Contel Technologies flat no: c-1 (first floor), ga- http://www.contelbd.com Limited 40/5 & 40/5a shahjadpur, gulshan, dhaka- 1212, bangladesh 18 Paragon House, E-mail: [email protected] DNS Software Ltd. 5 Mohakhali C/A, 5th Floor www.dsl.com.bd Dhaka 1212 Phone: 880-2-9893093-4, 8817513, 8823505 19 Level - 6, House - 103, Road - Email: Advanced app 01, Mirpur DOHS, Pallabi - [email protected] Bangladesh ltd. 1216, Dhaka, Bangladesh. http://www.aapbd.com Mobile: +8801717653445 20 Rupayan Center (6th floor) [email protected] ARENA Phone Bd 72,Mohakhali C/A http:// arena.com.bd Ltd. Dhaka – 1212 Bangladesh 21 86/2 New Eskaton, Ground [email protected] 3Devs Ltd Floor, Bangla Motor, http://3-devs.com Ramna, Dhaka, Bangladesh. 22 1st Floor, 161/B, [email protected] Talha Corporation Lake Circus (Singer Goli) http://www.talhatraining.com Kalabagan, Dhaka- 1205,Bangladesh 23 Adress: 2-B/1, Darussalam http://newgen-bd.com/ New Gen Road, Mirpur, Dhaka 1216 Bangladesh. Phone: 88 (02) 8023495-6, 8023462-3, 8034266, 9015165, 9015348 24 13/A, 7/A, (Ground [email protected] Skilled home floor),babar road, block - B, http://skilledhome.com (Rimjhim), Mohammadpur, Dhaka – 1207

+8801740092381 +8801745108215

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Appendix- C

Survey Questionnaire-1

Brief of the Company

Name of the Company/Organization: ______

Address: ______

Section-1: Profile of the App Development Company and Youth Engagement

Q-1.1: For which OS you develop apps? (Please put √ for multiple options)

Ans.: Android iOS Windows Phone

Others (Please specify______)

Q-1.2: What type of mobile apps you develop? (Entertainment, Informative, Games..)

Ans.: ______

Q-1.3: Is your company founded by a young app developer? (If no, please skip to Q- 1.4)

Ans.: Yes No

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Q-1.4: How old s/he was when we founded the company? (Please select a category)

Ans.: 18-25 Years

26- 30 Years 31-35 Years

Q-1.5: How many of your board members represents youths? (Below 35 years old)

Ans.: 1-3 Persons 3-5 Persons More than 5 0

Q-1.6: Q-1.6: If there are youths in board, then how many of them are female?

Ans.:______

Q-1.7: How many App developers’ works in your company?

Ans.: ______

Q-1.8: How many App Developers’ of your company are Youths? (Below 35 years)

Ans.: ______

Q. 1.9: How many youth female app developer?

Ans.:______

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Survey Questionnaire 2: Training on Apps Development

Q-2.1: Training category

Ans.: Basic Semi Professional Professional

Q-2.2: Training duration

Ans.: ______Days / ______Months

Q-2.3: Number of training programs per year?

Ans.: ______

Q-2.4: Number of participants per training program?

Ans.: ______Persons

Q-2.5: Training Modules are targeted to youth people? (Please put √ at multiple options if needed)

Ans.: For 18-25 Yes No

For 25-30 Yes No

For 30-35 Yes No

Q-2.6: Training materials are accessible by persons with disabilities

Ans.: Yes No

Q-2.7: Does your training include entrepreneurship program?

Ans.: Yes No

Q-2.8: Does your training include any competition program?

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Ans.: Yes No

Q-2.9 What are the ratio of sustainability of the female app entrepreneurs after receiving the training?

Ans:______

Q-2.10 What are the risk factors for the female participants of the training?

Ans:______

Q-2.11 What do you think about the limitations for young Bangladeshi women in participating app-training? Ans:______

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Appendix-D

Course Curricula

National Mobile Application Development Awareness & Capacity Building Program

Training Title: Android Application Development

Organized by: Ministry of ICT, Bangladesh.

Training Schedule:

5 Days Schedule Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 Day 4 Day 5 Time Java Android UI Database Map Publishing 9:30am Session1 30 Opening Android UI Shared Internet Introduction 10:00am Session1 60 Introduction (Widgets Preference Connection to Android about Android and Layout) Content & Parsing sensors Android UI Provider (XML & Tab JSON) in GCM(Push Android Notification) 11:00a m brea k 15 Break 11:15a m Session2 90 Getti ng Started Dialogs & SQ Lite Local App Play Store With Multimedia Database Distribution Java/About Operations Channel AdMob Java Navigation (Gra Drawer meenPhone OOP Alo-Ashbei) 20 min Google MAP 12:45pm break 30 Break 01:15 pm Session3 90 Environment Android Intent Androi d Make Setup: Fragment handler and distribution Development Support Android thread copy(APK) environment Multiple Services hands on eclipse, android Screen Broadcas t and submit SDK, JDK Listview (Background Recei ver to app Project Service) Smart market Anatomy & Government hello world Idea Session Event handling 20 min 02:45pm brea k 15 Break 03:00pm Session4 90 Practical Practical Practical Work Practical Closing: Work Work Work Open Question.

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Certificate Appendix- E Android Training Manual Prepared by the Ministry of ICT, Bangladesh

Note: This is not the full manual. It is a collection of excerpts of the total course manual. The full manual can be found at this link http://www.nationalappsbd.com/?page_id=1942

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Appendix- F

Research Team Organogram

Zahid Al Amin Team Leader

Faisal Md Abdullah

Lead Researcher

Dr. Abdullah Al Mizan Nasrin Sultana Mahmudul Hasan Md. Abdul Quayuum Research Assistant Research Research Associate Associate Editor

Sajjad Sabuj Nusrat Jahan Finance & Associate Editor Logistics

Alimul Hasan Aminur Rahman Mahfuzul Huq Hitlar A Halim Report Writing Graphics Data Collection, KII Analysis, Report

Nazmun Naher NafizaBarsha Naznin Lata Nafiza Naznin Jannatul Ferdous Urmee Data Collection Data Collection Data Collection Data Collection

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Appendix- G

Profile of the Contractor

International Institute of Media & E-Journalism (IIMEJ) Address: Rasul View, Level 7, 65 Mymensingh Lane, Banglamotor, Dhaka-1000, Bangladesh. E-mail: [email protected]; Web: www.iimej.org

PROFILE OF IMPLEMENTING ORGANIZATION - IIMEJ: International Institute of Media and E-Journalism is a non-government professional media think-tank organization utterly committed to promote the state of media and journalism in Bangladesh through research, capacity building and working in partnership with the government, civil society, national and international agencies, legislators, pressure groups in Bangladesh as well as the global space.

Background: The media is a major force in improving the quality of government. An independent and free media inform the citizenry on how they are being governed and provide a forum for public debate. Experience has shown that accountability

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and transparency tend to improve as the access to information increases. The more access to public information people have, the more they are equipped to demand accountability from those in positions of authority. What help the nation and government to move forward. believe this truth and to help the journalist and community work accordingly IIMEJ has formed in May 2010.since its formation IIMEJ has been engage themselves with several skill development program, and training including Research. With the theme "Journalism for Peace' International Institute of Media and E-Journalism aiming to accelerate human resource development in mass media. To materialize the aim, IIMEJ has been organizing different short and long-term training programs for the professionals as well as the aspiring to build career in journalism, improve their standard. IIMEJ works through conducting research and organizing various communications and mass media based programs to help the nation to get good governance. Besides, IIMEJ has been determinedly working to build a library and archive for the media professionals and establish a strong linkage with the national and international organizations involved with the development of mass media.

All the activities of IIMEJ are run by different sub-committees under the leadership of its Principal and Managing Director. In addition to observing the media movements, IIMEJ also conducts awareness raising activities on new media, media role, journalist activities to handle the conflict to strengthen the democratic process and institutions. IIMEJ undertakes special programs outside of Dhaka to skilled local journalist and concern community. It is recognized that IIMEJ’s activities helped increase participation of community in the e-government process.

Major Goal and destination of IIMEJ

The IIMEJ has been working to protect citizens’ rights and to establish social justice and peace in the society alongside of working as a centre for producing responsible and quality journalists.

Objectives 1. To help building a skilled manpower enriched with technological knowledge for media houses and accelerating professionalism of the media people through providing trainings;

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2. To help enriching the quality of journalism and to build a skilled journalists community focusing the e-government movements through introducing them with the latest subjects of discussion; 3. To help the aspirants becoming capable to work in a media house and introducing them with different types of media houses; 4. To provide different sorts of services to television, radio, online news media, newspapers, news agency and development organizations ; 5. To provide required cooperation to the media people to develop their relationship with different national and international institutions ; 6. To help enhancing qualitative development in exercising independent, responsible and ethical journalism ; 7. To participate in journalism affairs study, research and training 135programs in national and international level and to collect and publish journalism related information ; 8. To establish a modern library and archived enriched with journalism related books and information; 9. To inspire the people by producing different creative programs for electronic media houses alongside of inspiring the media people to practice objective and peace journalism; 10. To conduct different programs for children with a view to help building the next generation cultural minded and good citizens ; 11. To conduct advocacy and communication activities for establishing rights to information among the countrymen alongside of creating a gender sensitive media environment; 12. To build a platform where institutional education and training for media as well as practical know-how can be ensured ;

Areas of Work 1. Has been working for applied research on media, journalism, and other social and development issues. 2. Operates inter coordination based programs with local and international organizations. 3. Has been working for establishing a reach digital archive and a technically sound lab room where researchers and media professional will have the opportunity to do study and work. 4. Organizes short and long-term training course aiming to human resource development for mass media 5. To provide in-service training for the media people alongside of giving

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training to the people aspirant to build career in mass media 6. Conduct training on the basis of different organization’s need and requirement. 7. Planning to launch in house e-journal and regular research based publications.

IIMEJ Archive and Library: IIMEJ has been working for setting up a rich digital archive with subject wise news clips regularly since its inception. Media professionals, researchers, students, teachers and other relevant professionals are expected to use those data and information for their respective works.

This archive will comprise television, radio, online and newspaper news, picture, audio, video.

IIME has set up a library with the media, journalism, contemporary Bangladesh, history, literature. It is archiving relevant local and international books, journal and newspapers and other publications. A bibliographic database has also been prepared digitally for the smooth use of readers.

IIMEJ publication: IMEJ has been taking initiative to publish quarterly research based journal for evaluation and observation of the state media and journalism in Bangladesh with a view to improve the quality of journalism.

E-Journalism: IIMEJ has started a new program called E-Journalism. Apart from Dhaka, IIMEJ is going to create a unique platform of all the journalists across the Bangladesh. This initiative will be supported by IIMEJ but operated by dynamic team of professional journalists to boost up their professional integrity, improve their quality, raise their voice to uphold professional barriers and rights ensure press freedom and practice journalism at a common virtual platform.

Apart from the professional journalists, IIMEJ has targeted the youths as it has been creating a big network of university and college students. IIMEJ has been

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appointing its representative in every educational institute with a view to aware national, social, economical and media issues, engaging themselves in media profession through training, research and campaign activities.

Organizational Structure: The utmost policy making body of IIMEJ is the Advisory Committee that comprises seven members with national and internationally reputed personalities. It has five member’s Board of Directors lead by President and coordinated by Managing Director. IIMEJ’s every wing operated by individual team and supervise by separate Executive Committee. IIMEJ has been preparing to appoint 64 district representatives for expanding its activities and networks.

Major Activities: During its significant presence from last few years, IIMEJ has created platform for the working journalist to skilled themselves as well as to collaborate with the community for the betterment of media. Moreover IIMEJ has playing a significant role to transforming the traditional journalism into new media through its different activities with local journalist community. Believing that technology helps the government to ensure the transparency and control the corruption. IIMEJ is also concern about media movements in politics and conflict with the day to day happenings around the country.

Legal Status of IIMEJ IIMEJ is registered under Dhaka City Corporation (Ordinance 1983, Ord.XL 01,1943, Section 69)

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