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Promoting rural e-commerce can help expand digital financial inclusion in the country, experts at a conference said on Tuesday.
Rural e-commerce, including digital transactions and trade by rural people, has seen an upward trend over the last few years due to efforts by different stakeholders, including the government, they said.
The experts made their observations at a panel discussion on 'Promoting Digital Finance Innovations: Way Forward' at the 'Bangladesh Digital Financial Inclusion Conference' held at the Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in the city.
Digital business platforms and buyers could easily find each other, but for rural people it is difficult to find the right platform to do their business, said Rezwanul Haque Jami, EM Solutions Architect and the lead for a2i's e-commerce Team.
Kazi Mahfuz Mamtazur Rahman, team leader, Sarathi, Swisscontact, described its work with the garment workers and how it brought them under digital finance inclusion.
Sarathi is working with the financial services and supply channels for banking services to reach out to the underserved market segments, he said.
It is also working towards improving the level of financial skills and knowledge of garment workers so that they can do formal bank transactions, he said.
Prof M Harunur Rashid, chairperson, Healthcare Information System, said a good number of people in Bangladesh are falling below the poverty line every year due to expensive healthcare. He said rural people could not deal with health hazards due to lack of proper knowledge. To improve the situation, individuals should know how to record their own health condition and get health insurance.
In order to make people understand their need to attach with medical care and health insurance, the Healthcare Information System came up with a mobile app named Daktarbhai, which help people keep their health records, contact doctors and get health insurance, he said. Panel speaker Farmina Hossain, deputy director, Buro Bangladesh, pointed out some challenges facing the digital financing sector.
The challenges include high transaction cost, lack of awareness among clients, mindset of rural people and low financial literacy skills of people.