State Minister for ICT Division Zunaid Ahmed Palak today expressed the hope that the World Bank (WB) would expand its cooperation in Bangladesh’s ICT sector.

Palak expressed the hope when outgoing WB Country Director to Bangladesh Mercy Tembon paid the farewell call on him at his office at ICT Tower in the city’s Agargaon area, said a press release.

He praised the World Bank’s cooperation in various areas, including speedy resolution of strategic issues during Tembon’s tenure.

Currently two separate projects ‘Digital Entrepreneurship and Innovation Eco-System Development’ and ‘Enhancing Digital Government and Economy’ are going on under the ICT Division with WB loan support, Palak said, hoping that the existing relation with the WB will continue in the future and its partnership with Bangladesh in other sectors including the ICT will increase.

Tembon said Bangladesh’s economy is now very strong, so there is no scope to see Bangladesh separately in the global economy.

Bangladesh government has already made unprecedented progress in various sectors, including education, health, communication and ICT, she said, adding that Bangladesh is now at the stage of take-off.

Noting that resources are not important for the development of any country but skilled manpower, strong institutions and innovative ideas are very important (for development), the WB country director said, “In the near future, Bangladesh will not follow anyone as a model, but other countries will follow it as a model”.

Project Director of Enhancing Digital Government and Economy Dr Mohammad Mehedi Hasan, Project Director of Digital Entrepreneurship and Innovation Eco-System Development Abul Fatah Md Baligur Rahman, Managing Director of Star-up Bangladesh Limited Sami Ahmed and Innovation and Commercialization Specialist Md Abdul Bari were present at the meeting, among others.