The broadband internet through the 8.5 thousands kilometres of optic fibre line will be available to consumers in some 1,200 unions by November 2017.
Information and Communication Technology division Public Relation Officer Abu Naser disclosed this to the Daily Observer on Thursday.
Earlier on Wednesday, the cabinet committee on public purchase approved "Development of ICT Infra-Network for Bangladesh Government Phase-III (Info-Sarkar Phase-3). The new broadband connections would be available under this project.
"The implementation of the project of Tk 18, 36 crore will start in December this year" said Naser.
A total of 171 video conference systems, 554 business process outsourcing (BPO), pilot-based cloud platform, increased capacity of the existing network management system, setting up of network equipment and establishing help desk will be needed on an urgent basis to expedite the ICT infra-network project.
Chinese Exim Bank will provide loan worth USD 167 million under a Bangladesh government to Chinese government arrangement, official sources said.
The Information and Communication Technology (ICT) division has undertaken the project with an aim to give all the Digital Centres in the union parishads a mass line technology hub.
The proposed loan would be used to procure all the necessary products, infrastructural equipment and services from the Chinese state-owned firm M/S China Railway International Group Company Limited (CRIG) through a direct purchase method, according to a summary of the report of the cabinet committee on economic affairs. The Chinese government has already nominated the CRIG to implement the project.
ICT State Minister Zunaid Ahmed Palak said in a statement exclusively given to The Daily Observer on Wednesday said that the government will set up a total of 554 Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) Centres, an internet based working station at 64 districts, 64 upazilas, 319 pourasavas and 100 colleges. The divisional and district level BPOs and 100 colleges will be connected over 171 video conferencing centres."
The National Data Centre will connect in all the unions, upazilas and districts with bandwith of 10 gigabyte per Ethernet of National Backbone Network.