Bangladesh faces significant challenges in digital literacy and online safety, particularly among marginalized communi- ties and school children. Approximately 15% of the population is marginalized, residing in hard-to-reach rural areas with limited access to digital resources. Despite the rapid advancement of digital technologies, a substantial portion of the population remains digitally excluded. Rural households specially women lack access to the internet, and literacy rates in these areas are significantly lower than the national average. This digital divide exacerbates existing social and economic inequalities, leaving marginalized communities further behind.
Over the last year GP has ramped up efforts to drive digital literacy and online safety knowledge through digital skills trainings. These are being delivered nationwide to marginalized communities (65% women), mass youth population and also school children.
GP's Digital Inclusion Project for marginalized communities spans 32 districts and 3000+ unions, providing basic digital skills and online safety to eight (8) distinctive hard-to-reach communities. So far, the project in last 18 months has successfully trained 2.1 million individuals, with a goal of reaching 2.3 million by the end of 2024. To keep youth and leaders aligned in these areas, we are training youth to become local level youth advocates and engaging with local leaders to ensure sustainability.
The digital literacy and online safety for school children in Bangladesh is critical, with over 30 million school-age children needing safe and informed internet use. Only about 25% of schools have dedicated IT teachers, and less than 40% of children receive digital safety education. Many children, especially in rural areas, lack the skills to navigate the online world safely, posing significant risks to their well-being.
The Project on online safety for school children is developing comprehensive and up to date safety content and training 35,000 IT teachers and overall reaching a total of 4.2 million children.
Bangladesh has a youth population of approximately 47.6 million, which constitutes about 30% of the total population. As of the beginning of 2024, there are approximately 58.9 million young people under 15 years. While each year 2 Mn youth are ready to join the workforce, a major development challenges for Bangladesh is providing enough jobs; The lack of right skill sets amongst the potential labor force is creating growing unemployment, so much as 3.5Mn people remain unemployed in 2023. FutureNation program, Grameenphone Academy and GP Accelerator are active platforms to connect youth to economic opportunities through upskilling and investment connect.
Futurenation project in collaboration with UNDP are training mass unskilled youth population through platform futurena- tion.gov.bd. GP Academy together with our global partner Cisco on the other hand are actively upskilling youth to bridge the skills gap and connect with future economic opportunities including freelancing. So far the programs have completed 80,000+ certifications while offering 4449+ Job Offers. This year GP Accelerator has trained 2500 potential entrepreneurs from 10 districts.
Grameenphone is bridging the digital divide and ensuring sustainable digital inclusion across Bangladesh. This collab- orative effort by Grameenphone and its partners including Telenor, UNICEF and Plan International, Cisco, UNDP and others, prepares future generations for the digital age. The project's combined impact on digital literacy exemplifies a commitment to fostering a digitally inclusive society.
