Sri Lanka 1st_ Bangladesh 3rd most agriculturally digitalised in South Asia

Bangladesh is third among the most agriculturally digitalised countries in South Asia but this feat has been achieved with the help of non-digital enabling environments such as swift access to markets and adequate electricity coverage.

Government initiatives for utilising information and communication technology (ICT) to deliver public services at the national level also made a significant contribution in pushing Bangladesh forward in the World Bank's Agriculture Digitalisation Index (ADI).

Bangladesh achieved an overall score of 53.2 out of 100 in the ADI_ published on Tuesday in a book titled "What's Cooking: Digital Transformation of the Agrifood System." A higher score represents a stronger performance_ and only Sri Lanka and India are ahead in this region.

With a score of 80.6_ Sri Lanka topped the index among South Asian countries on the back of their availability of the mobile coverage and the non-digital enablers. Meanwhile_ with score of 62.3_ India stood at second thanks to their development of non-digital enablers.

Bhutan is closely following Bangladesh with a score of 49.6_ and placed at fourth followed by Nepal with a score of 49. Besides_ Afghanistan (38.3) positioned at the bottom of the index in the region_ followed by Pakistan (46.2).

The ADI evaluated 150 countries' digital transformation of Agrifood systems under three simple sub-indexes  Digital Agriculture Availability_ Digital Affordability and Non-digital Enabling Environment.

With a score of 72.4_ Bangladesh scored the highest in Non-digital Enabling Environment Sub-index_ which was based on four metrics  market access index_ access to electricity_ basic skills index and online services index.

The World Bank used this sub-index to measure the level of development of non-digital enablers and governmental capacity to support digital innovation.

Bangladesh scored 99.7 in the Market Access Index_ which was calculated based on the percentage of farmland within four hours of a settlement of at least 100_000 people. The other metrics used in the calculation are self-explanatory.

Bangladesh scored 46.3 in the Digital Affordability Sub-index_ which measured the availability of mobile services and devices at price points that reflect the level of income across a national population.

With a score of just 41_ Bangladesh achieved the lowest score in the Digital Agriculture Availability Sub-index  which estimated the share of farmland in a country with mobile coverage.

According to the World Bank calculations_ Bangladesh's 99.4% of total farmland has 2G cell phone coverage_ whereas 52.7% has 3G coverage. But when it comes to 4G_ only 0.1% of the country's farmland is covered.

Switzerland topped the index globally with a score of 91.7_ followed by the United Kingdom (91.2)_ Finland (90.9)_ Netherlands (90.9)_ and Ireland (90.7). On other hand_ with a score of only 17.9_ Chad stood at the bottom_ followed by Madagascar (18.2)_ Mauritania (24.6)_ Niger (25.4)_ and Sudan (28).