Anatoly Motkin, President of StrategEast, Oleg Petrov, Senior Program Officer, Digital Development, World Bank, and Rafal Rohozinski, an expert in geopolitical digital risk published their blog post entitled “Digital resilience is key to post-COVID recovery in Eurasia” on the World Bank website.
In their post, the authors discuss the role of the digital transformation of Eurasian states in countering the COVID-19 pandemic and ways to quickly overcome the socio-economic crisis caused by the pandemic.
In particular, the authors mention the case of the rapid transition to the online training format at the StrategEast EPAM IT HUB in Tbilisi immediately after the start of the pandemic enabling Georgian IT specialists to continue working despite global restrictions on travel and local lockdowns.
To increase digital resilience in Eurasia, the authors urge to invest in IT education: “It takes an average five to nine months to train an IT professional but according to some experts, you can expect a return on investment (ROI) within two or three months. And this has the potential to generate substantial new export earnings for the region.”
The authors see an increase in digital literacy among the population as another way to protect against crises like the one caused by COVID-19.
“To prevent and recover from future crises, countries in the region must adapt early and invest in fundamentals like digital skills. This will not only improve their resilience but also their competitiveness, while ensuring that governments and the private sector are better able to meet the needs of the citizens ”
The full blog post is available on the World Bank website: https://blogs.worldbank.org/digital-development/digital-resilience-key-post-covid-recovery-eurasia
