Without any government support freelance software engineers are outsourcing jobs from the world's big corporate houses.
Bangladesh
Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS), software
developers' common platform estimates the freelancers have exported
worth Tk 960 crore products last year.
According to sources the growing freelancers' earnings may exceed the official export figure for software.
Official
statistics say in the government book the export earnings of software
products for the fiscal year 2013-14 (FY14) was Tk1000 crore software
and with a 6.5 per cent growth in the fiscal 2014-15 it was Tk1060
crore.
The Basis data say more than 100 thousands freelance
outsourcing firms earned Tk960 crore income in the outgoing fiscal year
which is nearly that of the official figure and it is likely to exceed
in the current fiscal. The government's support is streamlining the fast
growing and scattered freelance software engineers across the country.
The
Information and Communication Technology Division has taken a scheme to
train freelancers who outsource jobs from the world's renowned
corporate houses.
A senior official told this correspondent that
they have so far trained more than 30,000 freelancers at district levels
across the country and the scheme is going on.
Manzur Mahmood, Chief
Executive Officer of the DataSoft Limited said freelancers require
infrastructural supports like all facility based high-tech Park and
internet connection at cheaper costs as this is the main raw materials
for developing software.
Basis Secretary Hashim Ahmed said if the
freelancers' software exports are registered in the book it may exceed
the official figures of exporting software.
He said it is a fact that
where freelancers export earnings are increasing every year in the mean
time official export growth for software is reducing in compare with
the previous years.
He said both the freelancers and the exporters maintaining official procedures are together exported about $250 million.
As per Basis data software export official software export growth is not increasing as per expectation.
The
Export promotion bureau statistics shows software export growth was
happening at 50 per cent during the FY09 to FY12 but the growth started
declining.
When asked about declining growth an office bearer said
due to increasing domestic demand many firms are busy with local market.
He said behind declining export growth the main problems are lack of
economic diplomacy, infrastructure development and financial assistance.
He
said in the growing export market Bangladesh is not actively branding
its capacity of developing world standard software. A free-lance
developer requesting unanimous said many big houses are taking the
free-lance outsourcing opportunities as they do not want to show their
income.
An official in the Ministry of Science and Technology's ICT
division said they are trying to bring the free lancers in a specific
system so that they may contribute more to the national economy.
He
said in the training course that the government is offering is getting
good response from the free lancers across the country and already some
have registered their names with the government.