State Minister for ICT Division Zunaid Ahmed Palak on Saturday visited a digital village in Cox's Bazar to oversee its activities.
To break the digital divide in rural areas and support the smallholder farmers in Tulatoli village located at Ukhiya, the special visit by Zunaid Ahmed Palak was organised by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
The FAO Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific developed the digital village initiative to support existing and potential digital villages, increase farm productivity and profitability, and combat hunger, poverty, and inequality in rural farming communities, a FAO press release stated.
Smallholder farmers connected with FAO's digital village initiative can receive various e-services from government and private actors. Apart from that, the digital village initiative can serve as an information exchange and knowledge-sharing platform among farmers, groups and communities.
With further transformation, it can be an entry point for digitalisation, employment generation for youth male and female, modernisation of agriculture and income generation.
There are 60 digital villages across Barishal, Rangpur and Cox's Bazar. These digital villages are being operated by producer organisations which are currently maintaining 57 virtual call centres to aggregate produce for collective marketing and facilitate bulk procurement of agricultural inputs.
These digital villages promote 23 digital agriculture applications developed nor supported by the government, they also provide rural farmers with digital literacy training so that they can take advantage of new opportunities.
Policy Advisor of a2i, ICT Division Anir Chowdhury, Deputy Director (In-Charge) of Department of Agricultural Extension, Cox's Bazar Ashish Ranjan Nath and Upazila Nirbahi Officer of Ukhiya in Cox's Bazar Imran Hossain Shajib accompanied the state minister during his visit.
Nearly 50 farmers, community members and officers from the FAO were also present, among others.
