text:
To make ICT more
accessible for persons with disabilities, the Supreme Council of
Information and Communication Technology (ictQATAR), has introduced
the countrys first eAccessibility Policy.
The policy aims to ensure people with
disabilities in Qatar have equal access to the technologies that can
enrich their lives, and covers a range of e-accessibility issues,
including websites, telecommunications services, handsets, ATMs,
government services, access to assistive technologies and digital
The policy is effective immediately and
ictQATAR will oversee the implementation of the policy across sectors
and monitor progress.
For many people with
disabilities, information and communication technology can be a
tremendously empowering and enabling tool, however, if these
technologies are not fully accessible, they may actually become tools
of exclusion or isolation. Qatars eAccessibility Policy, which was
developed in consultation with numerous stakeholder groups, will make
Qatar one of the most progressive countries in the region in terms of
bringing the benefits of technology to people with disabilities,
said Hessa Al-Jaber, ictQATAR Secretary General.
The primary provisions of the
eAccessibility Policy include:
Requiring telecommunications
service providers to provide accessible handsets, user interfaces,
relay services, special rate plans, emergency services and
accessible public payphones where appropriate.
Requiring public
sector organizations to develop websites and mobile content that can
be accessed by persons with disabilities.
Requiring all
public sector organizations, including government owned banks, to
implement service improvements that will ensure that public access
terminals/kiosks and ATMs are available at strategic locations and
usable by people with low vision blindness, deaf or hearing
impairments, physical disabilities and reading problems.
Requiring Qatars Assistive
Technology Center (Mada) to establish a fund to improve access to
assistive technologies (AT) and services, encouraging the wide
spread procurement of ATs, spreading awareness of the available
services and benefits of ATs and providing demonstrations, special
training and evaluations.
Calling to action all producers
and distributors of digital media in Qatar to improve the
accessibility of their content through accessible eBooks, online
information and special captioning for video programming.
The full
e-accessibility policy is available here.
(Source: FutureGov
The Universal
Service Obligation Fund of India (USOF) has
announced that it will fund a series of Pilot Projects for access to
ICT facilities combined with assistive technologies (ATs) for persons
with disabilities in rural India. Eligible licensed Indian Service
Providers interested in applying for pilot project funding will
shortly be invited to submit proposals in line with the Concept Paper
and draft Expression of Interest published at
Projects should
address accessibility in terms of hardware, software and human
interface and cover persons with various forms of disability such as
sensory (including vision and hearing), cognitive and motor
disability. The Service Providers will need to partner with a range
of stakeholders including telecom equipment manufacturers, mobile and
internet/broadband content providers, NGOs etc. Organizations
outside of India, including those that have developed accessible
ICTs, assistive technologies and suitable mobile applications may
consider participating in this effort by teaming up with Indian
Further details
(Source: USOF India)
Joint Administrator (F),
Universal Service Obligation Fund,
Room No. 1118, Sanchar Bhavan,
20 Ashoka Road, New Delhi 110001
Email: email@example.com
It is a fact that
telecommunications have had a positive effect,
more important in rural areas of the country. People and the
communities that they had access to roads to integrate into their
community, have been widely favored by the implementation of
Information Technology (ICT), which literally changed the lives of
its inhabitants. "Telecommunications facilitate the development
of business, increase productivity of activities such as livestock
and agriculture, although the level of technology that many people
use is the basic", said the president of the telecommunications
consulting firm Alterna, Liliana Ruiz.
In addition, she
said, it has generated a substantial improvement in public services
like health and education. "This caused the living standards of
rural populations improve, but the technological potential to develop
is even higher", she said to the official gazette El
In this regard, Ruiz
said that ICTs offer more than phone calls or surfing the internet.
"In rural areas have great untapped potential for development,
with the consequent creation of new businesses that will not only
allow the saving of financial resources but also of time". Ruiz
said the best way to leverage the benefits of telecommunications
technology is through policies that institutionalize their use and
"The efforts
made by the State, through the Telecommunications Investment Fund
(Fitel), have been instrumental in integrating populations. However,
while there is extensive development of mobile telephony, which has
grown faster, and the Internet, these services offer more benefits
that are not fully exploited".
Therefore, she said,
would be important to establish an institutionalized policy that
exploits its full potential. "It could be, by an office under
the President of the Republic" she suggested. According to the
Ministry of Transportation and Communication (MTC), the end of this
year about 12.045 locations will access to telecommunications
services such as public telephone, or Internet telephony subscribers.
Last year with the
support of Fitel, about 10.856 villages were benefited from these
important services. It is expected that by 2012, the number of
internet sites, residential and public telephony rise. Also,
according to MTC, at the end of next year will be a total of 15.820
locations with access to telecommunications services.
Up to date, Fitel
has a balance of resources by approximately of 400 million nuevos
soles (aprox. 133 millions US$) and in addition there are 398 million
already committed in the execution of various projects. In the first
case, they plan to invest 259 million soles for the National
Backbone, a fiber optic project. The MTC said that the remaining 103
million will be used in implementing an integration project between
Loreto and San Martin, to provide telecommunications services to more
than 350 surrounding villages. The government plans to increase the
coverage of rural population centers for voice communications
services (fixed, mobile and public use), which will increase from 27%
registered in 2010 to 77% in 2016.
(Source: El Peruano Newspaper)Further details
Pakistan, like many other developing
countries, has seen an explosion in its mobile communications market
in recent years. The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA)
reported a 65.4 percent mobile teledensity (The number of mobile
phones in use for every 100 individuals) and a total of 108,894,518
subscribers in June 2011. The number of subscribers has increased
threefold since 2005.
Measuring the number of
mobile phone users is challenged by shared use of phones, those who
own more than one SIM card, and the ownership of SIM cards by
non-phone owners. While the number of mobile subscribers is
officially 108 million, according to the PTA, those with phone access
might be higher and conversely those with actual mobile phone
ownership might be lower.
This dilemma is
illustrated in studies of mobile phone access and use by gender in
Pakistan. According to the Pakistan Institute of Public Opinion
(PIPO) 2010 Media Report, there seems to be a large gender disparity
in mobile phone ownership. However, the 2010
Mobile Life Pakistan Report produced by the Gilani Research
Foundation measures regular use as opposed to ownership. Very
different results appear.
In addition to gender,
James Linton Williams, founder of the Popular Engagement Policy Lab
(PEPL) talks about similar disparities across income groups on a
recent PEPL report. He cites 2009 survey data from LIRN
Asia, where they surveyed the poorest 60 percent of Pakistans
population. The study shows that, of the 109 million people in that
bracket, only 40.33 million own mobile phones, but 104.64 million (96
percent of the 109 million) had used a phone in the three months
prior to the survey.
Regarding mobilephone
activities, most Pakistani mobile users use their mobile phones to
make calls, according to the 2010 Mobile Life Pakistan Report.
Another activity, known as missed calling, is also popular. This
involves dialing a number, and then immediately when the calls gets
through, disconnecting it after 1-2 rings and before the receiver
picks up in order to save both parties from being charged incoming or
outgoing rates. Many Pakistanis might have predetermined signals
that these missed calls give (for example: a missed call could mean
the caller will be home in 10 minutes, or has reached a destination,
or will be here to pick you up). In general it is a free way to
AudienceScapes)Full Report
The user should say loud and clear voice that he wants to advertise on
social networking.
A new application for mobile
devices, developed by the institute ITEAM of Polytechnic University of Valencia
(UPV), allow "blind" more involved in social networks like Twitter,
thanks to voice recognition for posting.
UPV explained that the
application was worked for the Android platform and that will also benefit
disabled drivers, who may communicate by voice with other devices in their home
through Bluetooth or Wi-fi.
"The prototype uses a system
of recognition and voice synthesis to the control and management of
applications to capture and deliver information in audio format and serve as an
interface between the user and mobile", said Juan Carlos Guerri, one of
the researchers of ITEAM institute.
He indicated that the user needs
clear and audible voice the message that he wants to be published on Twitter; it
uses the microphone to the mobile device.
"This recognition activates
the motor to tweet transcribed to text and then synthesize it and play it. Once
the user to check the content and it fits what you want to communicate you can
publish it", he added.
With mobile telephone access reaching
over five billion of the worlds population, the United Nations
educational agency today announced the launch of an initiative to
harness the technology and bring mobile phone use into the classroom.
In a statement
issued in Paris, the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO) declared the opening of a global summit and
symposium gathering experts from around the world to discuss the
impact of the mobile telephone on education and learning.
Dubbed Mobile Learning Week, and
organized in partnership with the conglomerate Nokia, the meeting has
brought together close to 200 policy-makers, educators, academics and
researchers from across the globe in an effort to provide insight on
how mobile telephones can support teachers and students alike.
Initiatives promoting mobile learning
have already been spearheaded across a wide range of countries
including Mozambique, Pakistan, South Africa, Niger, Kenya, and
Mongolia where policies have already provided access to distance
education in far-flung communities and improved literacy among girls
and women.
According to recent data, 90 per cent
of the worlds population now has access to mobile networks,
prompting growing enthusiasm for the potential of mobile devices to
improve education access and quality.
(Source: UN News Center)Further details
The United Nations
technology body, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), is
calling for a wider use of technology projects in helping countries
adapt to climate change.
At the Durban Summit last week, the ITU
released a study focusing on how an ICT project allowed Ghanas
cocoa industry to become more resilient to the effects of climate
change. The ITU said Ghanas case should set an example for other
developing countries.
The study focuses on
how ICT can be used in optimising production by, for example, sharing
information in real time between producers and end users, said Dr
Bilel Jamoussi, chief of the ITUs Study Groups department, in an
interview with Business Green.
He said ICT has, in general, been
overlooked as a tool for helping developing countries adapt, and that
Ghanas case demonstrates the value that these countries can find
in technology projects.
Its a really
good sign that these countries are seeing how they can adapt, he
said. These countries are not always big producers of greenhouse
gases, but they are the most affected [by climate change].
The ITU believes that ICT has in
general been overlooked as a way of helping stem climate change and
to adapt to its effects, Jamoussi said.
Our key goal is
that ICT is viewed as an enabler and plays a central role in
adaptation and mitigation, Jamoussi told Business Green. Our
report and recommendations are a concrete example of that.
As part of its wider
support of ICTs role in mitigating climate change, the ITU has
created a set of standardized methodologies for assessing the impact
of ICT on the environment, and has participated in other initiatives
such as the development of a standardized, energy-efficient mobile
phone charger.
The ITU gave its approval for the
concept for a universal phone charger in 2009, with the aim of
drastically reducing the number of chargers produced, shipped and
subsequently discarded as new models become available.
(Source: eweekerope)Further details
Governments worldwide must boost
internet accessibility in order to nurture democracy and economic
development, entrepreneur Loic Le Meur said at the prestigious LeWeb
technology conference in Paris which he founded.
The conference brought together some
3,500 of the world's top digital experts and entrepreneurs from 60
countries to discuss the state of the technology industry and its
relationship with economic growth.
"Stage one is
to help provide those tools to help people express themselves and get
more democracy", Le Meur told AlertNet, the global humanitarian
news service run by the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
"The next stage
is economic development". He pointed to the potential that
remains for technology growth in developing countries.
But, while delegates focused attention
on how to develop internet technology and smart phones, others
outside the conference have pointed to how the more accessible,
standard mobile phone can aid social and economic development.
Millennium Development Goal 8 (MDG 8) -
one among a framework of global targets set in 2000 by the United
Nations to be met by 2015 to try and alleviate poverty - stipulates
that new technologies, especially information and communications
technologies (ICTs), should be made available to all, in cooperation
with the private sector.
Currently, at least 5.4 billion of the
planet's seven billion people have access to mobiles, which means the
MDG 8 target is achievable, according to a forthcoming paper to be
published by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and made
available to AlertNet.
Estimates indicate
that among those 5.4 billion people over 483 million come from
low-income countries and 2.6 billion from lower middle-income
countries, according to the paper titled "Mobile Technologies
and Empowerment". The paper also showed ICTs had an impact on
democratic governance, poverty reduction, energy use and the
environment, crisis prevention and recovery.
Further development
of the existing technology used for text messaging known as SMS
(short message service) on basic mobile phones could help African
farmers get their products to market in Europe for example, said Raul
Zambrano, an ICT policy advisor at the UNDP in New York.
"Most people have a simple, basic SMS voice phone - there are
only about 15 percent of people in Africa who can use the Internet",
Zambrano added.
(Source: Reuters)Further details
Health minister
Onybeuchi Chukwu says Nigeria must begin deploying information and
communication technology (ICT) in health delivery but insists it must
be driven by "a policy that's coherent, but more importantly
A national conference looking at
deploying information and communication technology has opened in
Declaring it open, the minister said
stakeholders must galvanise "action toward ensuring ICT is
employed in the best manner that will help to drive the health sector
toward" targets set in the National Health Development Plan.
traditional ways of doing things can no longer be considered
sufficient", he said.
Among new technologies in medicine is
mobile health, which allows the public get health information on
their mobile phones.
But the minister noted there were plans
to replace old plastic syringes with automatic ones next year.
He stressed that
deploying ICT in health could open up innovative ways to drive down
the cost of healthcare, improve education and training programmes,
accessibility and reliability of medical records. It could also make
disease control more efficient, Chukwu noted.
The health ministry is coordinating
with both the ministries of communications technology as well as
science and technology.
Science and
technology ministry has already launched a telemedicine project in
Lagos, according to the minister, Prof Ita Okon Bassey Ewa, noting
that a vibrant IT system could give a health sector "that
responds to needs".
Dr Andrew Mbewe of the World Health
Organisation said Nigeria needed to institute a national coordinating
mechanism for various e-health systems, coordinate investments in
e-health and health information systems from donors and partners as
well as assess appropriate policies at all levels.
(Source: AllAfrica News)Further details
ICT ministry awarded
tenders to connect more than 6,800 institutions for public education
- Colombia
The award of the
tender for Connectivity Public Institutions, project led by
Compartel Program, was awarded to firms Telebucaramanga, Unión
Temporal Aprende Digital, Unión Temporal Internet Para Todos, Unión
Temporal Colombia Digital, Media Commerce Partners, Unión Temporal
Gilat Fontic y BT Latam Colombia S.A., to provide connectivity to a
6852 total rural public schools in the country. The project has an
investment by the Ministry of $ 126,298 million.
After reviewing the
proposals made by the proponents, the grade was given to institutions
which offer connecting more and faster. This fact allowed
institutions to increase the number of schools beneficiaries of 6178,
corresponding to the target set in the tender, up to 6852 schools
with the outcome of the tender.
Thus, the ICT Ministry awarded the
contract to firms that offered the best financial offers and
connectivity, in addition to the requirements of the specification
With this initiative the ICT Ministry
is supporting the Ministry of National Education in its efforts to
generate new models of education in schools in remote areas with
difficult access.
"With this
result more than 6,800 rural schools in the country will have access
to the Internet twice to four times the speed with which they had
previously. Thus, more than 1'130,000 children and young people have
the same opportunities to use technology in their schools than those
who live in big cities", said Diego Vega Molano, ICT Minister.
Since 2004, the
Compartel program advances connectivity projects that have benefited
around 18,000 public institutions, most of these schools. With the
current tender the connectivity conditions are improved to the
beneficiary institutions, most of them located in rural areas of
(Source: Mintic Colombia)Further details
UNICEF and UN Women
have a launched an online centre to provide evaluators with resources
to design and manage evaluations that integrate equity, human rights
and gender equality.
The section of
Gender Equality and Human Rights Responsive Evaluations Community is
administered by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the
Empowerment of Women (UN Women). The purpose and the role of
evaluation in UN Women is to enhance accountability, inform
decision-making and contribute to learning on the best ways to
achieve womens empowerment and gender equality through operational
and normative work.
The consideration of gender and
human rights in the evaluation practice involves the integration of
gender equality and human rights dimensions in all steps of the
evaluation process and involves the analysis of the effects of the
interventions in enhancing or negatively affecting gender equality
and the empowerment of women. In this context, gender analysis
frameworks and feminist and transformative paradigms have key
implications for gender and human rights responsive evaluation.
This section aims to promote knowledge
on Gender Equality and Human Rights responsive evaluations by
providing access to various resources including publications, reports
and information on training opportunities. Also through this section
evaluation practitioners can access Gender Equality and Human Rights
responsive evaluations communities of practice and networks.
In addition, the section provides
access to UN Women Manual on Gender Equality and Human Rights
Responsive Evaluation a practical guide to help those initiating,
managing and/or using gender equality and human rights responsive
evaluations. It is intended for all international development
professionals who deliver or manage programmes and projects. The
guide provides direction, advice and tools for every step in the
evaluation process. It contains tools to aid in the process and
references to provide a greater depth of information on specific
topics and issues.
Access to this
virtual tool here
(Source: My
Luis von Ahn launched a beta version of the page www.duolingo.com
that assesses students by level and provides simple sentences to
Guatemalan Luis von Ahn, a professor in the School of Computer
Science Carmegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh (USA) launched a
beta version of a free site for learning languages.
The new project of
Von Ahn, who at 33 years old has been considered one of the 50 most
influential people in the world of technology, is the web
Ahn, a graduate in Computer Science in 2003 by Duke University (North
Carolina) and PhD from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh
(Pennsylvania) in 2005, was included in this year
into the 10 top New Faces of Ibero-American thought Foreign Policy
success lies in trying to develop programs using the human capacity
to solve problems that computers are not yet able to solve. It is
especially known for Captcha and ReCaptcha program, a computer
security application that uses distorted letters and numbers that the
user has to type correctly in a section blank.
The system
assesses students by level and provides simple sentences to
translate. If the user does not know a word, the program reveals its
meaning and hints for the student to remember the next time.
At the
same time the students can see how other students from anywhere in
the world has translated the same sentence before and start learning
the language dynamically. Once past a certain level, more complex
sentences are introduced.
Project has begun with the Spanish and German, but later will came
the French, Italian and Chinese.
(Source: RPP
A Kenyan is among two innovators
awarded $250,000 (approximately Sh25,000,000) to develop pre-natal
care solutions.
Two projects, one using cell phones to
deliver to expectant mothers in Kenya electronic vouchers for
pre-natal care and transportation, the other aimed at promoting
maternal and child health in northern Nigeria, will receive $250,000
grants from the Saving Lives at Birth Partnership.
Both projects were motivated by the
childbirth-related deaths of important women in the lives of the
African-based project innovators.
Although Kenyan Sam Agutu and Nigerian
Aminu Gamawa come from different countries and backgrounds, they
share a common passionate commitment - to save the lives of women
giving birth and guarantee infants a healthy start.
Agutu's sister died in childbirth on
the way to the hospital. Gamawa's mother died in childbirth too. Both
men say the deaths were avoidable if better care had been available.
They've channeled that devastating loss into powerful motivation to
improve the odds for women and their babies.
Sam Agutu's Kenyan group, Changamka
Microhealth based in Nairobi, is proposing e-vouchers delivered
through cell phones to encourage women to seek care during their
pregnancy and at birth.
In remote areas health care costs and
distance to clinics are barriers for women. The e-vouchers can be
used to pay for pre-natal care and transportation.
"Research shows
that not receiving adequate care is a leading cause of maternal
mortality in the developing world. Mothers who attend their required
ante-natal visits and who deliver in hospital stand an infinitely
greater chance of surviving than those who do not" said Mr.
Agutu. "We will use Saving Lives at Birth's support to validate
the effectiveness of e-vouchers, an SMS informational campaign and a
transport subsidy in encouraging pregnant women to seek health care".
The Development Research and Projects
Centre in Nigeria is relying on persuasion and experience to change
attitudes of some Islamic opinion leaders in the country's Muslim
northern states.
Each program will receive a $250,000
seed grant from the Saving Lives at Birth partnership, which includes
Grand Challenges Canada, USAID, the Government of Norway, the Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation and the World Bank.
(Source: Business daily Africa)Further details
Josh Nesbit was a student at Stanford
University preparing for medical school, when two conversations with
a doctor and a community health worker in Malawi changed the course
of his life.
I was doing HIV
research at a clinic in Malawi, in 2007, when I met a doctor who was
covering a catchment area of 100,000 people single-handedly, and a
community health worker who walked 35 miles to the hospital each week
to hand-deliver patient reports, said Nesbit. But he also realized
that he had a better mobile signal at that community health worker's
home than he did in Palo Alto, California. It became clear to him
that this new mobile infrastructure could be harnessed to bridge gaps
and coordinate health care services.
Inspired by volunteer
village health workers in rural Malawi, Medic Mobile was launched in
2009 by Josh Nesbit and three co-founders while they were still
students. According to the organization's website, Medic Mobile
develops technologies such as easy-to-use medical record systems and
SIM card applications to help health workers communicate and
coordinate patient care, and provide diagnostics using low-cost
mobile technology. Medic Mobile believes that well-coordinated and
connected health systems can save lives.
In June 2011, they
announced the first SIM card application for health care, created
with support from The Maternal Health Task Force and PSI. These
applications run on any GSM device, from the simplest US$15 handsets
to smart phones. Using SIM apps, they plan to bring structured
information exchange to the last mile, supporting health
workers and patients. Today, Mobile Medic has over 30 partnerships in
15 countries to improve health care delivery in extremely resource
poor conditions.
An article on the
website of Global Pulse, the international health journal of the
American Medical Student Association, cites World Health Organization
(WHO) estimates a shortfall of 4.3 million health care workers in the
developing world. Medic Mobile believes that the intelligent
deployment of mobile technology can help improve access and outcomes,
even with this lack of health professionals.
Mobile Media now works with more than
30 international and local partners. The group has established
programs in 70% of Malawis districts and implemented projects in
twelve countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The results
continued - drug stock reporting improved from less than 35% to over
80% across 10 districts in Malawi, costs decreased four times and
efficiency increased 112 times for community-level treatment support.
(Source: AudienceScapes)Further details
Kenyan women have been at the forefront
of some recent newsworthy ICT innovations such as iCow and M-Farm.
Dinfin Mulupi covers their success stories and finds that their
entrepreneurship might help open doors for disadvantaged women across
Farmers in Kenya are benefiting from
two technological innovations that have earned praise within the
international development community. Called iCow and M-Farm, they
help small farmers to manage their herds, access market information
and connect with agricultural extension services. Both products were
also developed by women, who have made their mark in the Kenyan
technology sector in recent years.
The iCow is a mobile
phone app for cattle farmers created by Su Kahumbu-Stephanou, an
organic farmer who was inspired by her own challenges and
experiences. Currently used in 27 Kenyan countries, iCow was created
initially to help farmers track the fertility cycle of their cows,
but it now incorporates other services like helping farmers gain
access to veterinary officers and animal feeds. It also collects and
stores farmers' milk and breeding records and sends farmers best
practices for dairy management. The innovation received first prize
in the 2010 Apps4Africa competition sponsored by the U.S. Department
of State.
Women's successes in the ICT sector
come amid strong investor interest in Kenyan tech innovators
generally, with an increasing number of start-ups receiving funding.
Meanwhile, widespread penetration of mobile phones in Kenya and
Africa as a whole has created a brisk market for mobile apps and
other products and services.
Government efforts to
start digital centers across the country also are broadening access
to technologies. These "pasha centers" (pasha means
"inform" in Swahili) will have between 10 and 20 computers
connected to the internet, as well as fax machines and printers,
among other equipment. The centers will provide a wide range of
electronic services to the community including e-mail, e-learning and
The rapid growth and evolution of the
mobile sector has had a huge impact on our social interactions and on economic
progress worldwide. In emerging markets in particular, the industry continues
to see massive expansion as an increasing proportion of the population becomes
connected. The Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) are diversifying their products
and services to generate additional sources of income. This growth has created
lots of opportunities for employment and entrepreneurial activity. However, in many
parts of the world, women have been less able to seize these opportunities due
to a variety of factors that reflect underlying gender inequality for
example, lower levels of education, lack of start-up capital, restrictive gender
roles and lack of confidence.
One of the most direct ways in which
women entrepreneurs can take part in the growth of the mobile industry is by
joining the retail channels of MNOs as sellers of mobile products (primarily of
airtime, but also of more sophisticated offerings in markets where MNOs provide
higher-end mobile-enabled services such as Mobile Money). MNOs have some of the
most extensive retail channels, with coverage extending to remote rural areas.
MNO retail channels can also be useful conduits for providing other important
services such as aid distribution, education and health services, and these can
offer further economic opportunities for women entrepreneurs.
In practice, the targeted inclusion of
women entrepreneurs in the retail networks of MNOs is an idea that has been
gaining currency for some time. Several leading MNOs have specific programmes
in place to appoint women as retail network partners in their respective
markets. However, to date, no research study has been conducted to investigate
the benefits of including women entrepreneurs in the retail networks of MNOs as
a distinct model.
This study aims to demonstrate through
its findings that including women entrepreneurs at all levels of the mobile
value chain (MVC) makes commercial and social sense for both, MNOs and women
entrepreneurs. To support this argument, they have looked at how women
entrepreneurs are being brought into the MVC across 11 markets.
See Full Report
(Source: Cherie Blair Foundation)
The Technical
Committee on Communications Strategy for the Colombian state on
Prevention and Gender-based violence "Women you have rights"
invite all the agencies, organizations, media and general public to
respond through social networks the question: "What is your
contribution to write a story without violence against women?"
in commemoration of the "November 25th, the International Day of
No Violence against women".
The appointment is
in Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, online media and web site
www.mujertienesderechos.org. We hope that 10,000 women and men
manifest through social networks on not violence against women using
the label (hashtag) # mujertienesderechos and making that November
25, International Day of No Violence Against Women" the most
mentioned theme in social networks (trend topic).
The ICT Ministry will develop
simultaneously the # HoraTIC in the Plaza de Bolivar in Bogota and
will be projected on a screen messages that you receive via twitter.
The # HoraTIC is a space for citizen participation through Twitter
account of the ICT Ministry (@ Ministerio_TIC), which seeks to
generate discussion on topics related to information technologies and
(Source: MINTIC)Further details
The World Bank's CGAP Technology Blog
recently posted an article about InterMedia's AudienceScapes' Haiti
Mobile Money Tracker. A tool created to examine a series of household
surveys, commissioned by the Gates Foundation in 2010, that helped
monitor the impact of USAID and the Gates Foundation's Haiti Mobile
Money Initiative. An initiative that featured a $10 million fund to
provide incentives to mobile service providers to quickly launch and
expand mobile money (m-money) services.
The survey revealed strong potential
for increasing the number of m-money adopters. At the time of the
survey, only 10% of respondents had signed up for m-money. However,
more than 80% said they were aware of the existence of m-money
services, and 71% said they would use a mobile phone to send or
receive money in the future.
The survey also identified the profile
of early adopters of m-money a helpful guidepost for planning
future deployments. Over 60% of early adopters had completed at least
a secondary education, compared to only 37% of the population as a
In terms of economic strata, the survey
indicated that over 60% of the population has difficulty affording
sufficient food or clothing, or both. This compared with only 31% of
early m-money adopters, indicating that the services have yet to
reach deeply among Haitis truly impoverished.
Early adopters also have a different
age profile than the population as a whole. One might expect younger
people to be early adopters as a result of their assumed comfort with
mobile technologies. In fact, the survey found that, while close to
50% of Haitis population is under 30, only 38% of the early
adopters were in that age group.
Other common
demographics considered in such studies, such as gender and rural vs.
urban wellers, showed little variation from rates among the total
population. In addition, sign-up rates among men and women, and among
rural and urban respondents, were roughly equal.
61% of current m-money users said they
were already recommending the services to others at least once a
week, indicating that word of mouth was helping to expand awareness
and use quickly throughout Haiti.
(Source: Audiencescapes)Further details
In a recent report,
titled Connected Agriculture, Vodafone and
Accenture identified 12 opportunities for mobile phone technology to
increase agricultural income and productivity. Some of these
platforms are already widely used in Africa, while others are still
in the early stages of implementation.
1. Mobile payment
Mobile payment
systems give farmers without access to financial services an
inexpensive and secure way to transfer and save money using their
mobile phones. By allowing smallholder farmers to save small amounts
of money, receive payments quickly in times of need and pay for
agricultural inputs via their phones, mobile payment systems replace
costly traditional transfer services and the need to travel long
distances to collect funds.
2. Micro-insurance
micro-insurance systems can safeguard farmers against losses when bad
weather harms their harvest, encouraging them to buy better quality
seeds and invest in fertiliser and other inputs. This can improve
productivity and boost farmers livelihoods as well as enabling
suppliers to expand their market among smallholder farmers.
3. Micro-lending
Micro-lending platforms could connect
smallholders in Africa with individuals elsewhere willing to provide
finance to help the farmers to buy much-needed agricultural inputs.
4. Mobile
information platforms
Through mobile information platforms,
farmers receive text messages with information that help to improve
the productivity of their land and boost their incomes. Governments
and agricultural support organizations can use the platforms to
distribute information about available subsidies and programmes.
5. Farmer helplines
Farmers call a helpline and speak to
agricultural experts who can provide answers to agricultural queries.
6. Smart logistics
Smart logistics uses mobile technology
to help distribution companies manage their fleets more efficiently
reducing costs for farmers and distributors, cutting fuel use and
potentially preventing food losses.
7. Traceability and
tracking systems
Mobile technology can be used to track
individual food products through the supply chain from grower to
8. Mobile management
of supplier networks
Food buyers and exporters can use
mobile phones to manage their networks of small-scale growers and
help field agents collect information.
9. Mobile management
of distribution networks
Distributors of farming inputs such as
seeds and fertiliser could use mobile technology to gather sales and
stock data, improving availability for farmers and increasing sales.
10. Agricultural
trading platforms
Linking smallholder farmers directly
with potential buyers through a mobile trading platform could help
them to secure the best price for their produce.
11. Agricultural
tendering platforms
Online platforms for submitting and
bidding on tenders for food distribution, processing and exporting
could make the agricultural supply chain more competitive and
12. Agricultural
bartering platforms
Mobile could help agricultural workers
in rural areas exchange goods and services and improve communities
livelihoods. For rural people with little or no disposable income,
exchanging goods, services and skills with community members is an
important part of their livelihoods.
(Source: Africa News)More details
There is currently a gradual shift from
an economy of material goods to an economy of intangible assets and
relationships, especially for services. This transition, combined
with the knowledge society, plays a key role in a country's readiness
to absorb technology.
Innovative use of modern technologies
in developed countries has become an integral part of their future
development strategies, and has the same importance as the efficiency
of financial markets, the investment environment, and the quality of
public administration and its services. Electronic communication
networks and services play an important role in the fundamental
conditions for the economic, social and cultural progression of
society in all developed countries. In particular, they accelerate,
expand and improve communications, which promotes the development of
society as a whole in accordance with the requirements of citizens,
businesses and state institutions.
Effective use of
information and communication technologies (ICT) increases
productivity and competitiveness, whilst also leading to significant
cost savings and other positive effects, such as transferring labour
to activities with higher added value in fields where ICT has been
comprehensively implemented. A significant factor of the ICT sector
is that its development is closely tied to the needs of society, and
quickly responds to them. This is due to the fact that they provide
the communication and computing infrastructure for most activities
taking place in the country, and simultaneously provide tools for
increased efficiency, innovation and competitiveness in virtually all
sectors of the economy. ICT plays a significant role in the internal
processes and innovation activities in all sectors, contributing to,
for example, a 36% increase in efficiency in the chemical industry,
76% in transport and logistics, 59% in the engineering industry and
86% in the automobile industry. The Czech government appreciates the
importance of electronic communications and has already approved a
national policy Digital Czech Republic.
By making use of accessible that
is, affordable and geographically available electronic
communication services, interested parties can be provided with
access to relevant information very quickly and cheaply. Therefore,
electronic communication plays an important part in the everyday life
of society. In conjunction with the other technologies and services
used in the information society, electronic communication has an
ever-increasing role in the standard of living of the population, in
improving the business environment, in the development of
international commerce, in education, and in cultural and social
Without doubt, today's developed
European society considers that quality internet access is not a
privilege to be enjoyed by only the population in urban areas.
Therefore, efforts are being made to provide internet access to all
parts of the population, for whom high-speed internet access may, in
view of the environment in which they live, be in relative terms an
even greater benefit than for people in urban areas. The solution for
the disparities between cities and rural communities as regards the
conditions for the use of ICT is to ensure comparable accessibility
to electronic communication services, and in particular to services
provided by means of high-speed internet access. This is also a basic
prerequisite for overcoming the so-called 'digital divide' between
urban populations and those of rural communities. This divide
generally arises due to a lack of opportunities for high-speed
internet connection and the impossibility of using the services
provided through it. Therefore, the basic objective is to reduce this
divide between rural communities and cities.
(Source: Public Sector News)Further details
Hosted by Ericsson,
the first Networked Society Forum (NEST Forum) took place in Hong
Kong from Nov. 11-13. Leaders and authorities, from the ICT industry
and governments, gathered at NEST to discuss how ICT could be
utilized to accelerate education and learning for everyone, every
where. It's a pity that the proceedings of the forum didn't get much
attention in Saudi Arabia, because many of the topics presented were
extremely relevant to the debate on how to enhance education here in
the Kingdom.
Consider these points on education and
UNESCO and UNICEF report that almost 70
million children are out of school globally, with millions more
leaving school early without acquiring the knowledge and skills that
are crucial for a decent livelihood, and about 800 million adults
lacking basic literacy skills. In the US, one out of four high school
students never graduates.
Doubling the broadband speed of an
economy increases GDP by 0.3 percent, according to research conducted
by Ericsson, Arthur D. Little and the University of Chalmers. The
same research found that for every 1,000 broadband connections, 80
new Internet jobs are created. For every ten percent of mobile
broadband penetration, an economy adds one percent sustainable GDP.
An October 2011 report from the UN's
Broadband Commission for Digital Development found that 30 percent of
people worldwide are Internet users. In developed countries, around
half the population has mobile broadband and about a quarter has
fixed (wired) broadband. In developing countries, however, the
figures are a small fraction of these, at 5.4 percent for mobile
broadband and 4.4 percent for fixed (estimated, end 2010).
Online education is growing. The Khan
Academy is the largest free online school in the world, with one
million students a month viewing 100 200,000 videos per day on
YouTube. According to iNACOL, Chinas first online school was
created in 1996; today it has expanded to more than 200 online
schools with enrollments exceeding 600,000 students.
One of those who has put forward ideas
which are in opposition to conventional education methods is
Newcastle University Professor Sugata Mitra. He has been conducting
experiments with several models of self-teaching, through his
Hole-in-the-Wall project (www.hole-in-the-wall.com), as well as
through experiments with Self-Organized Learning Environments
(SOLEs). Having succeeded in helping Tamil-speaking children teach
themselves the basic concepts of biotechnology in English, and
without teacher assistance Mitra is openly challenging the wisdom
of education that requires a teacher to stand in the front of a
classroom to share knowledge.
Mitra is a leading proponent of
Minimally Invasive Education (MIE). At NEST he advised that if we
are evaluating students based on their ability to memorize basic
facts, as we often have in the past, then we are teaching yet another
skill that computers have made practically useless. Instead, we need
to reconsider the aims of our education and assessment methods
(Source: Arab News)Further details
The State intends to
expand Internet coverage in the country.
Seek greater efficiency to offer more services to citizens online.
How many times did
you use a cell phone in the last two days? How many times have you
consulted some information, the management made or communicated with
someone via the Internet? There is no doubt that information and
communication technologies (ICTs) have become necessary tools for our
daily work. Currently, many state and private institutions offer
electronic services that allow their users to perform several
actions, proceedings or payments through its web pages. Many people
can get rid of long queues, paperwork and other delays, with only a
few clicks.
Also, there are
more public entities that make intensive use of ICT. An example is
the Peruvian Government Portal (www.peru.gob.pe), which has become a
reference site and access to public entities. Through it, you can
access to the Standard Transparency Portal, in which all entities of
public administration are shown in a standardized manner to the
citizens, being in charge of updating the institutions themselves.
Another innovation
is the implementation of the Platform for Interoperability of the
State (PIDE), which provides to the citizens public services and the
electronic exchange of data via Internet and mobile telephony.
However, these
advantages of technological progress cannot be still enjoyed by a
sector of Peru because the digital gap (the difference between people
who have Internet access even those without access to a computer) is
still high.
According to the
company of Advance Computer Technology Corporation of Peru, the
computer penetration rate is 12 per 100 inhabitants, while the
regional average is 20, and in some countries reaches 30. But to
achieve that goal, they must first reduce the digital gap in the
country. Thus, it was decided to invest in overhead fiber optic
network for the rapidly growing information and increase
communication radio cell. "Multiply the capacity of fiber optics
for many people to communicate at high speed".
About a month ago,
the government announced the State Interoperability Platform (PIDE),
which will provide to the citizens with public services and the
electronic exchange of data via Internet and mobile telephony.
The Government has
plans to expand broadband services to remote areas of the country.
Vice President of Infrastructure of the Corporación Andina de
Fomento (CAF), Antonio Juan Sosa, shows that the authorities of Peru
requested support to achieve this goal. They said that Boadband
projects do not require much investments and CAF could initially
provide 50 million dollars which what they can do a lot.
With the
participation of about 1,200 public school teachers in Colombia,
started the 4 th National Meeting of Teachers Digital Education".
The inaugural event was in charge of the
ICT Minister, Diego Molano Vega, the Education Minister Maria
Fernanda Campo, Minister of Telecommunications of Ecuador, Jaime
Guerrero and the Director of Computers for Schools, Martha
As part of the
event, which seeks to socialize the educational experiences with the
use of technologies, the ICT Minister said that with the program
Vive Digital they could increase the use of the Internet in the
In pursuit of this
objective, the ICT Ministry reduced the prize of computers. In the
case of the lower strata they are also working to lower financing
costs of acquiring computer equipment. On the other hand, they expect
to reach more than 800,000 computers for poor children in colleges or
"Teachers are transformers and
builders of dreams that will allow young people to learn these new
technologies and be digital educators", said ICT Minister Diego
Molano Vega.
The Minister also
said that if there are more services on the Internet, the
infrastructure is used more and the price is lower, allowing more
parents to connect and then have more number of users. The goal for
2014 is that all Colombians have, at least, one connectivity solution
thanks to modern information superhighway.
Meanwhile the Education Minister, Maria
Fernanda Campo, said that ICT is key to reduce dropout rates, taking
into account that the numbers are very high and occur mainly in
public institutions of the most remote areas.
As part of the
event, Martha Cunningham, executive director of Computers for
Schools program, announced that technology tools, innovation,
skills development and digital content, contribute to the reduction
of digital gaps. With this she means that new technologies help to
improve education and enable the convergence of different materials
on a computer.
Also, she showed very important
information. According to a study by the Universidad de los Andes,
where teachers and students have greater access to technology,
educational dropout rates decrease by 4%, and the ICFES score
increase by 2%. Also, they said that the possibility of entering
higher education increases by 5.1%, and improve by 4.6% on the income
of the workforce.
The ICT in Agriculture e-Sourcebook is
intended to offer agriculture and other development practitioners a
set of tested solutions, good practices, and methodologies, along
with promising applications, that enable them to leverage ICT and
harness innovation for more effective agricultural and rural
development outcomes. The sourcebook brings together thematic notes
and over 200 case studies from all over the world into a single
easy-to-use compilation for those working in the agricultural sector.
Access to Full
ICT in agriculture News)
The demand for higher education has accelerated worldwide. Between
1999 and 2008, the number of students enrolled in higher education
institutions (HEIs) increased by 65 million, with much of the growth
being seen in East Asia and the Pacific. In fact, the global demand
for higher education is predicted to expand from less than 100
million students in 2000 to over 250 million in 2025.
The prevalence of information and communication
technology (ICT) and the impact it has made in all aspects of our
lives are compelling reasons for HEIs to try to capitalize on 21st
century tools and technologies to address 21st
century issues and challenges. This has motivated some HEIs in taking
the lead to reshape the landscape of their educational systems as
well as teaching and learning practices. Over time, the number of
universities embracing new technologies to conduct the business of
education is expected to soar. However, many HEIs may require
guidance and assistance in their change process to minimize their
teething problems, reduce costs, utilize appropriate technology and
tools, and engage staff with proper knowledge and skills.
UNESCO Bangkok coordinated a research study to document the use of
ICT for higher education in the Asia and Pacific region in 2009 with
the support of the Japanese Funds-in-Trust. Targeted at Ministry of
Education officials and specialists responsible for higher education,
administrators and faculty members of HEIs, and higher education and
ICT providers, the objective of the study was to increase
understanding of how ICT can be used to:
design and develop curricular contents;
deliver higher education programmes and courses;
enhance the learning process; and
increase the efficiency of the administration and management of
educational systems.
Seven case studies from Australia, Hong Kong-Special Administrative
Region of China, India, Peoples Republic of China, Republic of
Korea and Singapore were commissioned to focus on three main areas:
open and distance learning; blended learning; and administration and
In all the cases discussed in this publication, ICT is used not only
for the delivery of lectures and materials, but also for
administration and management purposes. It is clear that
administrative functions such as student registration, grades, course
schedules and even staffing evaluation, have benefitted from the use
of ICT. The chapters on the Hong Kong University and the Indian
Institute of Management, Calcutta, focused specifically on
administration and management issues, albeit under highly different
conditions and perspectives. They provide an interesting contrast but
also reveal several areas of similarity regardless of their starting
points or resources available.
(Source: UNESCO)Further details
One of the factors said to have
retarded education development in Tanzania is the lack of teachers, qualified
teachers for that matter. There is no doubt about the efforts by the government
in trying to raise the standard of education and ensuring that all Tanzanians
have access to education.
Many schools have been built in
recent times almost throughout the country, but many of these schools lack
teachers. Schools situated in the remote areas of the country where
transportation is a problem are most affected by the lack of teachers because
some of the teachers show reluctance in reporting to such areas.
The government has elaborate plans and strategies of producing as many teachers
of different grades to be distributed to primary, secondary and institutes of
higher learning as possible. The government has also specific plans of ensuring
that all necessary teaching aids like books, libraries and laboratories in
order to make the education wholesome.
But the biggest challenge facing
the sector is whether the teachers are not redundant in the wake of improved
technical and technological advancement. It is now common knowledge that
technological development in Information and Communication (ICT) has permeated
almost every area in life.
And information and communication
technology use in education is making enormous headways in improving quality
and access to education. It has further been shown that the use of ICT in
education can help improve memory retention, increase motivation and generally
deepen understanding.
Information and communication
technology can be used to promote collaborative learning including role
playing, group problem solving activities and articulated projects. It is
promoting new approaches to working and learning, and new ways of interacting.
The issue is on the long term impact of ICT on the teaching and learning
Though researchers are confirming
that ICT changes the nature of motivation to learn, other issues raised at this
point is what kind of competence and skills will teachers really need to
acquire to be effective in an ICT based learning environment? There is an
on-going debate on whether teachers are becoming redundant as a consequence of
the use of ICT in education or whether a teacher-less classroom is simply a
The system is
fairly simple. A user registers for mobile phone banking with their service
provider and is given a mobile "e-wallet" - an application on their
SIM card that is linked to their phone number.
When the user wants to pay for services or transfer money to
someone they simply have to go to an agent and pay the desired amount, which is
loaded onto the "e-wallet". The payment is made and the recipient can
withdraw the money from an agent. There are various agents affiliated with the
mobile service providers across the country, making the service easily
accessible to those in rural areas.
It is a convenient system that no longer limits the womens
movements. Thelma Nare, and the women in her co-operative make regular
trips to Bulawayo to sell produce, like Mopani worms. This means that they miss
paying their monthly subscriptions.
Mobile network
giant Econet Wireless,
which has five million subscribers, introduced the service in September and
was quickly followed by its competitors, the government-owned NetOne and Telecel.
These service providers have affiliated agents throughout
the country, which include the Zimbabwe Post Office, supermarkets and stores
where people like Nare can access their funds."I was in the city and was
told about the use of mobile phones to transfer money. When I told the other
women in my money club, it seemed to be the answer to our problems", she
The model is
borrowed from Kenyas pioneering M-Pesa, which has experienced phenomenal
growth from 20,000 users at its launch in 2007 to an estimated 14 million this
Girlie Moyo,
40, another member of Nares money club said that in the past the women had to
gather under a tree to make physical contributions. Now, the convenience of the
mobile transfers means "we can co-ordinate our contributions without
concerns about distance".
While money
transfer services sprouted across the country in the aftermath of the mass
exodus of Zimbabweans to work across the world, the "bureaux de
change" remained in the cities. So those in the rural areas were forced to
rely upon undependable and expensive cross-border transporters who demand up to
20 percent of the total amount being sent.
Far away from the concept of
Innovation that someone can find in Silicon Valley, where,
usually this term is associated with the commercialization of new
products, or improved processes and more efficient. The paradox of
this dominant model is that even the most celebrated innovations,
most popular, are those that solve problems that do not exist yet,
and therefore create needs that until now they did not have.
It is very tempting to speculate that,
since this problem happens in other continent, African innovations do
not concern us and should be ignored. Big mistake: first, because
these problems exist, and second, because it is associated with a
market of more than one billion people (fastest growing), and
finally, because innovations in Africa may prove extremely useful
Taking the case of credit cards. Hardly
changed since the fifties of last century! If executives from Visa,
MasterCard, American Express and others would make life easier, they
should hear the case in Africa.
For any of these titans of the economy
would be a surprise the appearance of "M-Pesa" in Kenya: a
platform that opens new horizons for the circulation of money which
could be used like a inspiration. It is not, as was believed, of a
banking system, but a technology that lets people transfer money
between phones. The difference is radical: it does not require a bank
Just the lack of innovative credit
instruments left Kenyans. "Four years ago, when we launched
M-Pesa [Pesa means money in Swahili, and M-Pesa mobile money], only a
small fraction of the population had a bank account, and is expensive
to open" said Waceke Mbugua, Safaricom.co.ke responsible for
marketing, the first mobile operator in Kenya and the project
"A large number of people live in
big cities and send money each week to their families who live in
other provinces. A lack of access to the banking system should take
themselves or rely on the stack of bills that they sent with the
driver when they go to their families` hometown".
Launched as a pilot project in March
2007 (thanks to Vodafone's investment and support from the Danish
Government), the service now has 15 million users, 80% of the base of
Safaricom, which holds 75% of voice market in the country. Even more
impressive: "The funds that now flow through M-Pesa equivalent
to 25% of GDP", said Sitoyo Lopokoiyit, an economist at the
company. Most of the transactions made in half a U.S. dollar. He
adds: "From the beginning, our service has transferred 11,500
million dollars. There are no interests or loans, and transactions
are made instantly. Rarely money available remains intact over a
(Source: El País Newspaper)Further details
Six-country study
examined use and public perceptions of libraries in Ethiopia, Ghana,
Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe; most see libraries primarily
for educational purposes but recognize potential for much more.
New research on
people's perceptions of public libraries in Africa demonstrates that
awareness of public libraries is high and a majority view libraries
as very important to both communities and individuals. Library users
and non-users, librarians, library officials and government decision
makers alike view public libraries primarily for educational purposes
(90% across all groups), however a range of other information
services are emerging in libraries, including Information and
Communications Technology (ICT), that have the potential to help meet
community development needs.
The six-country
study found a significant majority of all respondents (80%) believe
the biggest benefit that public libraries offer is the opportunity to
learn and to develop new skills. A growing number of people view
libraries as a source for national and local news and information on
important topics including agriculture, health and employment. Public
library users and government officials view libraries as "essential
to them personally and to the greater community".
agrees that public libraries are essential. But more awareness and
support is needed for library services that go beyond providing books
and places for study", said Monika Elbert, senior policy advisor
at EIFL and lead on the research project. "Access to knowledge
is critical for development and public libraries are uniquely
positioned to provide ICT-enabled information services that will
contribute to countries' medium and long-term development plans.
Libraries are a hub where, for example, at-risk youth can access
computers and learn new technology skills for the 21st century,
unemployed people can learn job-seeking skills and farmers can find
valuable information about new farming methods-all of which are key
strands of community development".
In addition to
raising awareness of the information services libraries provide, the
research shows that there is a strong demand for more technology
resources. Among library users, only 14 percent report using
computers or the Internet at public libraries. A lack of computers is
one of the primary reasons library users (37%) and the local
authorities that operate libraries (53%) report being dissatisfied
with library services. Non-users say they would be motivated to use
libraries if more access to online content was available (29%) or if
there were more computers in general (24%). A significant majority of
librarians (72%) would like to see more funding invested in
technologies to meet community needs.
(Source: All Africa
News)Further details
After more than ten years of
support for a people-centered approach to embedding modern ICTs within Poverty
Alleviation Programs, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC)
has reviewed project reports, study program evaluation and meta-evaluations, in
order to distil lessons learned on how ICTs can really help to improve development
cooperation programmes and more particularly to enhance voice and
accountability programs.
The purpose of this paper is to
provide a tool box for operational units at SDC, its partners and external
parties. It should inform about how to use ICT strategically (in combination
with old media) for improving development processes. It aims at strengthening
the effectiveness both in classical development programmes and in governance
related programmes, i.e. enhancing democratization and making the voices of the
poor and marginalized heard as major tools for achieving poverty reduction.
The Manual/Tool box is based on
former evaluative studies on ICT for Development, programme evaluations,
experiences of Non Governmental
Organisations (NGOs) and cientific literature on how ICTs can and have effectively
contributed to better participation, specially by the poor and marginalized.
This body of experience was complemented with current knowledge on journalism,
media and communication mainly within developing countries.
The paper starts with a few
clarifications on concepts and definitions moving on to explain their current
knowledge (and its deficiencies) on ICTs in development. It then list major
insights on how to use ICTs in combination with old media and tailor effort for
different topics and target groups. Finally, they invite operational units to
look at the practical opportunities to use ICT s and media within different
Access to Full Report
Girl Hub Rwanda on
Wednesday launched Ni Nyampinga, a new girl-focused magazine and radio show,
so as to empower teenage girls. Girl Hub is
a joint venture between the Nike Foundation and the UK Department for
International Development (DFID) to ensure that girls in developing countries
are involved in the design and implementation of policies and programs that
affect them.
Thornley, brand manager for Girl Hubs Rwanda office, explained that the
project is designed to provide adolescent girls with tools that will enable
them to exploit their potential while strengthening self-belief and make good
decisions for themselves.
Ni Nyaminga is about
fostering a culture for girls that gives them the space, time and tools needed
to experience their teenage years in the most positive way, Thornley
explained. We believe the magazine and the radio programs will be great
motivators for girls, give them greater voice, while also having a positive
impact on their parents and brothers.
added that the new platform for Rwandan teenage girls will be connecting them
with other girls by offering them role model stories and advice to share
experiences and inspire them with great ideas for future improvement. The
bi-monthly magazine will cover topics such as Rwandan culture, health, English,
development and economic empowerment, while the weekly radio program will be
hosted by a team of Rwandan girl journalists who will make shows about issues
that matter most to them and their peers.
platforms will prompt audiences for feedback and input through social media,
mobile and suggestion boxes in the community, encouraging girls to connect with
Ni Nyampinga,
each other and decision makers, mentioned the platform designers.
The magazine
will initially be freely distributed in Kigali as well as the Northern and
Southern provinces at the end of November, and nationwide in early 2012; while
commencing November 26, the radio show will be broadcast on five radio stations
Girl Hubs
Rwanda office is part of initiative already operating in Ethiopia and the north
of Nigeria among other countries so as to unleash the Girl Effect offering
the chance to grow into healthy mothers, active citizens and educated members
of their societies and transform their families, communities and nations along
the way.
The Rwanda Focus News Paper)Further Details
This comes at a time
when broadband access in East Africa is still low, with the typical
speeds yet to match those in the developed
world. The broadband targets cover, affordability, policy,
connectivity and general up-take, all of which are pegged on a
four-year timeline, with the ITU measuring each country's progress
First, the UN commission -- which met
recently at the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Telecom
World, 2011, summit in Geneva -- expects countries to have a national
broadband plan or strategy or to include broadband in their universal
The second target deals with connecting
broadband to homes, with 40 per cent of households in developing
countries having Internet access by 2015.
There is yet another target for
affordable broadband. By 2015, broadband services should be made
affordable in developing countries through adequate regulation and
market forces.
The final target set by the UN
commission is getting people on-line, with an expected Internet
penetration of 50 per cent in developing countries and 60 per cent
Before the arrival of submarine cables
at the East African coastline, the region relied solely on satellite
connectivity for Internet access.
This had various demerits stemming from
bandwidth availability, speed, cost and subsequent uptake.
This technically
eclipsed the region from the digital world. Arrival of the three
major submarine cables has opened up the region to the Web, but
challenges still abound. Key among these is bottlenecks in the last
mile infrastructure and pricing.
notwithstanding, Dr Hamadoun Toure, ITU secretary general, said: The
targets are ambitious but achievable, given political will and
commitment by governments, working in partnership with the private
sector. Also, in a press release, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon
said: "By working together to apply technology to real-world
issues, you will enable information and communication technologies to
be a catalyst for social, economic and sustainable development. You
will help us accelerate towards the Millennium Development Goals".
(Source: All Africa News)Further details
The ability to utilize social media, mobile devices and the Internet
more freely in the workplace is a key factor for young professionals and
college students when it comes to deciding which job offer to accept,
finds a new study which adds that this may be a greater factor than
According to the report released by Cisco
Systems, an open work environment that accomodates social media, device choice flexibility as well as demands to work remotely is
important to future generations in the workforce. Mobile networking, device
flexibility and the blending of personal and work
lifestyles have become key components of a work environment and
culture that are increasingily important in determining which companies will
land the next wave of industry talent, the networking giant said.
The study found that about 33 percent of college
students and young employees under the ages of 30 said they would prioritize
social media freedom, device flexibility and work mobility over salary in
accepting a job offer. This indicated that the expectations and priorities
of the next generation of the global workforce would not focus only on monetary
More than two in five college students and young
employees, or 40 percent and 45 percent, respectively, added that they
would accept a lower-paying job that had more flexibility when it came to
device choice, social media access and mobility than a higher-paying job with
less flexibility. Some 56 percent of college students also indicated that if
they encountered a company that banned access to social media, they would
either not accept the job offer or would join the organization but find a
way to cirucumvent such corporate policies.
The survey also found that the days of single device
ownership were over as more than three out of every four employees carried
multiple devices such as a laptop and smartphone, or multiple phones, and
computers. Sine 33 percent used at least three devices for work.
The event,
which was held in Geneva from 24-27 October, has brought the brightest
minds and most influential leaders together to debate the key issues that will
shape the future of an industry that now pervades virtually every field of
human endeavour.
A vibrant
opening ceremony sponsored by China Mobile, the worlds largest mobile operator
with over 600 million subscribers, featured President Ali Bongo of Gabon;
Commodore Josaia Voreqe Bainimarama, Prime Minister of Fiji; Igor Shchegolev,
Minister of Communications and Mass Media, Russian Federation; Doris Leuthard,
Head of the Federal Department of Environment, Transport, Energy and
Communications, Switzerland; Sheikh Abdullah Bin Mohamed Saud Al-Thani,
Chairman, Qatar Telecom; Jianzhou Wang, Chairman, China Mobile; and Dr Hamadoun
Touré, Secretary-General, ITU.
Dr Touré
noted how, for the first time in ITU Telecoms 40-year history, tens of
thousands of people from around the world were joining the event using the full
range of connected technologies. The event, he said, was a genuine
conversation reflecting the concerns, dreams and visions, not just of people physically
present at the event but of those all around the world following the event
remotely from their homes, offices, schools, and through a network of 100,000 telecentres around the world.
The official
ceremony was followed by a more informal event celebration in the OpenSpace
arena, where participants heard from additional dignitaries including Mark
Muller, Conseiller dEtat, Geneva; Dr Babatunde Osotimehin, Executive Director,
UN Population Fund (UNFPA); and Mohamed Khalfan Al Qamzi, Chairman of the Board
of the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) of the United Arab
The United
Nations Conference on Trade and Development says the rapid increase in mobile
phone deployment in Zimbabwe has created business opportunities for small and
medium-scale entrepreneurs in the country.
In its
information economy report for 2011, UNCTAD said such entrepreneurs are able to
conduct electronic business or e-business as 59 percent of Zimbabweans have
access to mobile phones compared with only about 5 percent in 2005.
penetration, though still below the average of 77 percent in developing
economies, is playing a critical role in boosting micro and small enterprises
in Zimbabwe, UNCTAD said. It noted that there is a gender gap in mobile phone
ownership in the developing world with 300 million fewer women than men owning
mobile devices.
and Communications Technology Minister Nelson Chamisa told VOA that e-business
has become a key component in reviving Zimbabwes economy and creating business
opportunities for smaller players.
commentator Rejoice Ngwenya said that while many small-scale entrepreneurs are
doing business over mobile phones, mobile service quality remain an issue.
is need for service providers to improve services in order to create more
opportunities for small-scale businesses", Ngwenya said.
The report
said that as mobile phones are the main ICT tool used by micro-enterprises and
SMEs in low-income countries, these trends reinforce the likelihood that mobile
networks will be their main way of accessing the Internet in the near future.
Africa, where 84 million mobile handsets are already capable of using the
Internet, 7 out of 10 are expected to be Internet-enabled by 2014", the
report said.
(Source: Voice of America News)
In the 10 months since the organization
TeleSehat opened a second pilot telemedicine center in the Pakistani
city of Gujar Khan, more than 3,000 patients have been treated. Such
numbers point to the great potential of telemedicine to bridge the
healthcare divide in Pakistan.
Due to an insufficient healthcare
budget, a shortage of good doctors, and poor, ill-equipped public
hospitals, Pakistan is unable to provide all its citizens with even
basic healthcare services. Given the sheer lack of healthcare
facilities in remote villages, villagers suffering with serious
illnesses and health emergencies often have no other option but to
travel extensive distances into the main cities. As the cost of
traveling is prohibitive for many who survive on meager incomes,
these villagers either rack up great debts or forego medical
attention entirely.
Closing the healthcare gap between
those who live near medical facilities and those who do not was the
impetus behind TeleSehat (Sehat is Urdu for Health). Asad
Karim (also the CEO of a local technology firm, Comcept) and Syed
Mahmood Hussain launched TeleSehat in the summer of 2008. They
founded the organization to establish telemedicine centers to deliver
healthcare to Pakistanis living in inaccessible locations.
Telemedicine is not a completely new
concept to Pakistan, and certain projects have been quite noteworthy.
Launched in 2001, the Tele-Health Programme, for instance, was the
countrys first telemedicine initiative. Jaroka Tele-healthcare,
Sehat First and TeleDoctor, all similar local telemedicine
initiatives, soon followed.
But the question remains: Can
telemedicine prove successful in a country like
Pakistan?Telemedicine is the only hope for countries like
Pakistan, insists TeleSehats head of business development,
Nabeel Ahmad Malik. However, this can only prove successful if the
service delivery model is designed in a way that it suits all the
stakeholders, which includes hospitals, doctors, TeleSehat itself,
the local population and the respective government.
The first UNESCO publication to be made available on
the OER Platform is the UNESCO Model Curricula for Journalism
Education. The Curricula has been very successfully adapted by more
than 60 university journalism schools in over 50 countries. They
have agreements with the journalism schools of the Polytechnic of
Namibia and the University of Namibia to share their adaptations of
the UNESCO curricula as OERs on the Platform.
By persuading and
assisting additional journalism schools to share their adapted
curricula in OER format on the Platform, they
provide the professor, curricula developer, or quality assurance
assessor looking to develop their own curricula with an unparalleled
opportunity to easily and intuitively select and compare curricula
from near-by or international institutions, in their own language.
They are then able to easily, legally, and freely copy the
content closest to their requirements to adapt to their local
UNESCO will continue to upload new
publications to the Platform. For 2012, work has commenced on the
UNESCO Media and Information Literacy Curricula from the
Communication and Information Sector and the General History of
Africa Curricula from the Culture Sector.
Special guests at the OER Platform
launch include Dr. Tjama Tjivikua, Rector of the Polytechnic of
Namibia and Mr Edwin Tjiramba of the University of Namibia.
The Platform was developed with a Free
and Open Source Software (FOSS) framework by the University of
Witwatersrand, South Africa within the Africa Virtual Open
Initiatives and Resources (AVOIR) Consortium comprising of 11 African
The UNESCO/Commonwealth
of Learning Policy Guidelines for OER in Higher Education was
also launched on Tuesday 1 November by the UNESCO Director-General
and Sir John Daniel, President and CEO of the Commonwealth of
The Launch will be live-streamed on the
The Twitter hashtag for the Launch is:
Technology giants discuss ICT
trends across classrooms and why the United Arabic Emirates (UAE) is leading. The complete
digitization of curricula and the integration of Microsoft's Kinect technology
are but a few emerging trends global technology giants expect to see manifest
in Middle East classrooms.
and communication technology (ICT) in education was the basis for last week's
BETT Middle East exhibition in Abu Dhabi, where Gulf News caught up with
officials from Hewlett Packard (HP) and Microsoft to discuss forthcoming trends
in education.
discussions I've had I think we will see an increase of the digitization of
course content with more curricula and books being stored in clouds", said
Antoine Barre, vice-president of HP Personal Systems Group for Middle East and
Africa. "A second trend I see is ICT will no longer be placed next to or
complementary to educational pedagogy but instead emerge within it as the two
merge together".
He said
course content will develop in a way that will allow for the integration of
multimedia technology in order to facilitate student understanding, an example
of which could be the ability for students to simulate complete chemistry
experiments on their computing devices.
third trend I see is increased mobility as students will have their educational
data available to them everywhere through any type of device, laptop, tablet or
smartphone", he said. "I think this will enable students to be more
efficient in how they find answers to whatever questions they have in life
I think this goes beyond the scope of academic training".
Azza Al
Shinnawy, Public Sector Education Lead at Microsoft, said educational
institutions in the UAE, whether schools or universities, are indeed expanding
their scope of ICT into education. "The
[ICT] expansion is happening at various levels depending on the leeway of
freedoms, but the wave is coming at different strengths in both the public and
private education sectors", she said.
are probably the most ready and exposed as we talk ICT outside education, but
they are in the best position to absorb what comes up in the classroom". She added,
however, that although some teachers are ready to embrace the ICT wave, more
effort still needs to be exerted when it comes to teacher training. "Traditional
teaching methods need to converge with 21st century teaching and learning".
Both Microsoft and HP are working closely with the Abu Dhabi Education Council
with regard to teacher training and other initiatives.
(Source: Gulf News)
Almost everyone in this village
in central India has a complaint. Electricity comes only three hours a day. The
road has potholes. Widows pensions arrive late. The school lunch program often
runs low on food.
Villagers say they send letters,
call a government complaint line and wait outside officials offices for help,
but never get a response. All our complaints go into a blind well of the
government, said Mukesh Chandravanshi, 30, a farmer.
Now a simple cellphone
text-messaging program is providing a more direct line of communication between
villagers and the government. Developed by activists, local officials and an
information technology company, the system ensures that complaints are
immediately acknowledged and that residents regularly receive updates on how
and when their problems will be resolved.
Launched in two districts in two
states, the system decreases the chances that a problem will be ignored by
holding officials accountable, according to its developers. Such technology
does not guarantee a solution, but it can transform the relationship between
citizens and the government in a bloated bureaucracy beset with corruption and apathy,
analysts say.
pocket in the village has a mobile phone nowadays. If we can turn this into a
direct pipeline to the government, we will have the power to complain and be
heard, Shafique Khan, a field coordinator for the program, called Samadhan, or
resolution, said as he demonstrated how to use it to villagers sitting under a
tamarind tree.
Samadhan, people can go to a Web site to see where most problems and delays
occur and assess the performance of officials in those areas. The data can be
used to identify systemic bottlenecks in the governments delivery of services.
This month,
the program which was supported by the U.N. Millennium Development Goals
campaign has received 530 complaints through text messages, such as my water
handpump is not working, health worker is absent and the village bridge has
collapsed in the rain.
groups and IT companies are increasingly using crowdsourcing technology to help
make the government more efficient, empower people and even mobilize protesters. The ubiquitous
cellphone, with about 750 million users in India, and open-source Internet
platforms are being deployed to ensure that trash is picked up on time, to
track bribes and to help people learn English, find jobs and report incidents
of sexual harassment on the streets.
(Source: The Washington Post)
Through I trust
in ICT, the ICT Ministry through its Digital Experience Plan seeks
to promote the use of ICT, and zero tolerance for child pornography,
sex tourism.
To do so, they will
have different reporting platforms such as website, interactive
lectures for the education community around the country, social
networking, music and cultural events for the community in general.
"The Living
Digital Plan has also a component of safe and responsible use of ICT.
Through this initiative we will combat child pornography and child
abuse in the network. We will be absolutely relentless in the
protection of minors on the web", said ICT Minister Diego Molano
"I trust in
ICT" (en TIC confío) will have a stand located in Hall 6 of
Corferias in the Expociencia, the attendees will learn about the
goals and objectives of the strategy, interacting with various
technological devices such as tablets, computers and video games, and
share their experiences regarding the use of ICT.
For new and more
updates on this strategy, visit www.mintic.gov.co, virtual
communities and the hashtag in twitter: # EnTICconfio.
(Source: MINTIC Colombia)Further details
His Majesty King Abdullah on Saturday
stressed the importance of ICT tools in improving the quality of
healthcare services.
Referring to the e-Health Programme
Hakeem launched at Prince Hamzah Public Hospital on Friday, the
King credited the successful implementation of the programme in part
to Jordans broadband capacity.
He also acknowledged the support of
Cisco Systems, noting that the company first came to Jordan in 2002
to help the Kingdom improve its education sector.
His Majesty made the remarks during a
special roundtable session on the sidelines of the World Economic
Forum meeting to inaugurate the first healthcare ICT taskforce, with
the participation of Cisco executives and experts from local ICT
Addressing the participants, King
Abdullah noted that forming a healthcare ICT taskforce would help in
empowering Jordans ICT companies and promoting them locally,
regionally and internationally, in addition to providing job
opportunities for Jordanians, and promoting and strengthening the
countrys health services
Speaking at the opening of the session,
Cisco Chairman and CEO John Chambers noted that the ICT sector in
Jordan is witnessing impressive growth, pointing out that the number
of ICT companies in the country grew from 20 in 2003 to 450 this
Meanwhile, Mohammad Tahboub, chairman
of the Information Technology Association of Jordan-inj@j, noted that
the taskforce will be focused on achieving multiple objectives,
including rapidly replicating the Hakeem programme nationwide and
positioning Jordan as a regional hub for ICT solutions in the
healthcare sector.
The Healthcare ICT task force is an
initiative of int@j, the King Abdullah Fund for Development, Cisco,
and local partners.
Also at the roundtable session, the
King presented Chambers with Al Hussein Decoration for Distinguished
Contribution of the First Degree in recognition of his efforts to
strengthen Jordans education and ICT sectors.
(Source: Jordan Times)Further details
Deputy Executive
Secretary of CEPAL, Antonio Prado, considered the event to be held
until Thursday, will contribute to the creation of an independent
regional broadband market and, that will allow the expansion of
information and communications technology.
The meeting was attended
by national policy makers on the issue of Argentina, Chile, Colombia,
Costa Rica, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru.
According to the
Regional Centre for Broadband, between April 2010 and April of this
year there was a significant improvement in the availability of the
Internet service, since the price was reduced on average 37% of one
megabyte per second.
However, the service
rate remains almost five times higher in Latin America and the
Caribbean, compared with the average price of industrialized
(Source: UN News)Further details
ITU is calling on
schoolchildren across the world to join
a global metaconference
at ITU
Telecom World 2011
(24-27 October, Geneva, Switzerland) on how technology can be
harnessed to solve socio-economic problems and accelerate progress
toward the Millennium Development Goals.
Students and teachers are encouraged to sign up
their schools or classes and send in their ideas, prototypes and
innovations in areas where technology could be harnessed to:
alleviate poverty and hunger
improve education
address gender inequality
make sure everyone has access to health care
protect our environment
improve the lives of disabled people
close the gap between the developed and
developing world
Students are asked to consider
burning questions such as how can we close the gap between rich and
poor? How can we make
disabled peoples lives easier?
Or how can we improve
education for all?
Ideas and prototypes will be shown to the more than 5,000 influential
delegates expected to attend the event, including Heads of
State/Heads of Government, industry CEOs, technology gurus, digital
innovators and delegations from students home countries.
As well as the chance to influence key ICT
decision makers, taking part in the metaconference can provide
teachers and students with a valuable real-world context in core
curriculum areas such as history, geography and mathematics.
Ideas will also form a key part of the ITU
Telecom World 2011 Manifesto for a Connected World, a collaborative
vision that will be developed out of the event focused on how
connected technologies can make citizens happier, healthier, safer
and smarter.
Those unable to attend in person will be able
to follow the action as it unfolds from wherever they are in the
world via live video streams. They will also be encouraged to network
and share ideas beforehand, participate remotely in workshops and
feed into key discussions as they take place.
Children are our future and
deserve the opportunity to have their voices heard. Were delighted
that the power of technology will enable children everywhere to join
the discussion and share ideas and innovations alongside global
leaders, said Dr Hamadoun Touré, ITU Secretary-General.
(Source: ITU
Newsroom)Further details
Technology can be used to
spur business growth in developing countries, a UN agency says. The
Internet, computers and mobile phones facilitate banking services and
improve access to market information.
Information and communication
technology (ICT) enables private sector growth in developing
countries, according to report published Wednesday by the United
Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
The African ICT sector is
growing rapidly. Last year, there were close to 500 million mobile
phone subscribers. But there are wide disparities across the African
continent. In 2010, less than one in 10 Ethiopians had a mobile phone
compared to more than seven in 10 Ghanaians, according to the
International Telecommunications Union. This year, Ghana was
reclassified by the World Bank as a lower middle income economy.
Despite Ghana's high mobile
phone usage, ICT has yet to make a substantial contribution to the
country's private sector development, according to the World Bank. It
estimates 80 percent of the business sector is informal.
"The IT revolution [in
Africa] is enabling smaller farmers to have access to information
which they didn't have earlier, but not much has changed for larger
companies," said Sebastian Kahlfeld, a senior fund manager at
DWS Investments, Deutsche Bank's investment arm.
Mobile phones in particular
are enabling access to services like banking and information,
according Sebastien Dessus, the World Bank's lead economist for
Ghana. "In theory, [ICT] can play a role in enlarging markets
because access to information improves and transaction costs are
reduced," he noted.
Farmers now use mobile phones
to obtain market information on the latest prices for their crops. In
Ghana, cashew nut farmers can use a phone application to compare
trader bid prices. And since 2008, the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange
has granted farmers access to real-time information via text
messages, electronic display boards and a website.
Kenya's mobile banking
system, M-Pesa is bringing banking services to millions. The service
has 20,000 agents in the country compared to 400 for the largest
bank, according to UNCTAD ICT analysis chief Tobjoern Fredriksson.
Apart from providing banking
services, ICT has also helped create employment for thousands since
it was launched in 2007. The service, which was developed for
person-to-person transactions, is now being used by small
entrepreneurs to carry out payments, Fredriksson said.
But technology is not
only good for enlarging the market and empowering small-scale
businesses, it can also be used to fight corruption, according to
UNCTAD. ICT improves transparency and accountability, said Johan
Hellstroem, a researcher at Swedish Program for ICT in Developing
Regions. "The very presence of mobile phones decreases
corruption and secret activities because it leaves footprints and
audit trails", he added.
Corruption is third leading
constraint to doing business in a country after electricity and tax
rates, according to a 2010 World Bank survey.
Crowdsourcing techniques like
Kenya's Ushahidi can be used to report incidents of bribes or
corruption. Similar initiatives are springing up all over Africa;
with stopthebribe in Nigeria, and No bakshish in Cameroon. Through
such initiatives and global ones like bribespot and corruption
tracker, ICT is empowering people to take a stance against
corruption, according to Transparency International (TI).
(Source: Deutsche
Welle News)Further details
Specifically, the National Primary
Healthcare Development Agency, an agency under the Health Ministry in
Nigeria responsible for development and strengthening of primary
healthcare nationwide, was formed to support the promotion and
sustainability of high quality primary healthcare system and achieve
the Millennium Development Goals relating to the health sector.
Alongside efforts by the World Health
Organization and the various UN agencies that deal with
health-related issues to improve the healthcare delivery system,
concerted efforts are being made to reduce the differential access to
technology of the developed and the developing world.
It is at the convergence of health and
technology that eHealth initiatives evolved, creating an
unprecedented opportunity to improve access to services and
innovations. So what is the way out? Enter the mobile health
(mHealth) initiative.
Stakeholders at a recent mobile health
(mHealth) workshop put together by MTN Nigeria, voted in favor of
adoption of the mobile healthcare system. Already, a United Nations
report notes that this system has capacity to help meet four of the
eight Millennium Development Goals, MDGs. Basically, mHealth broadly
encompasses the use of mobile telecommunications devices and
multimedia technologies as they are integrated within increasingly
mobile and wireless healthcare delivery system.
In order words, it is the practice of
medical and public healthcare supported by a mobile device, including
the use of voice, data and SMS. By adopting mHealth in the healthcare
delivery system, many more people, will potentially be reached and
the health of the people and communities will be greatly enhanced.
This approach is particularly important
due to the rapid adoption of mobile phone technology in developing
countries. While mHealth has matured in industrialised nations, the
field is still evolving in a developing country such as Nigeria. But
argument for it is strong. As mobile technology grows, more and more
people acquire mobile phones and other mobile devices, making them
part of their everyday lives.
It then becomes easier for medical
personnel to interact with them and provide health services, obtain
health information to aid their researches and make it easy for them
to provide the right medical solutions to health challenges in remote
(Source: Vanguard NewsPaper)Further details
The Report shows that the potential of
leveraging information and communication technologies (ICTs) to
develop the private sector is far from fully exploited. It finds that
many national and donor strategies related to PSD currently fail to
take adequate account of the ICT potential, which has greatly
expanded thanks to changes in the global ICT landscape. The Report
then makes policy recommendations on how to remedy this situation.
The Information Economy Report 2011 identifies
four facets of the ICT-PSD interface and argues that policy
interventions should take into account this holistic approach.
ICT infrastructure as a factor in the investment climate.
use as a factor to improve the performance of the private sector.
ICT producing sector as a strategic component of the private sector.
ICT use as a component of interventions aimed at facilitating PSD.
In these areas, UNCTAD makes several policy
recommendations, such as:
To take a comprehensive and systematic approach when integrating the
ICT dimension into PSD strategies in developing countries.
continue to extend affordable and relevant connectivity to locations
with poor ICT infrastructure.
adopt regulatory frameworks aiming to improve confidence in the use
of technologies and their applications.
include ICT modules in business skills´ training programmes.
harness mobile money services to meet the needs of MSEs and to make
financial markets more inclusive.
use ICT tools to reduce the cost of doing business, and to help MSEs
bring goods and services to domestic and international markets.
To develop Donor Guidelines to ensure that the ICT potential is
fully harnessed in their PSD strategies.
The Information Economy
Report 2011
explores various options and examples of interventions by national
governments and their development partners related to the four facets
of the interface between ICTs and PSD. Among
the cases cited are:
Customs automation in Madagascar and Liberia and reforms to
streamline business registration procedures in the Philippines, as a
means to provide a more conducive business environment.
to increase the number and quality of entrepreneurial and ICT skills
in Egypt, Singapore, Burkina Faso, Ghana and Panama as a means to
promote the development of human resources.
and promoting the development of mobile money applications in
Africa, as a means to enhance financial inclusiveness and open up
business opportunities for micro- and small enterprises.
case of ICT freelancers in Bangladesh, as an example of existing
opportunities to find low-skilled employment in the ICT producing
The use of ICTs to support women entrepreneurs in developing
countries, as a means to overcome the existing gender gap in
available digital opportunities.
In the Statistical Annex of the Report UNCTAD
presents among other things new data on ICT use by enterprises of
different size and in various industries.
(Source: UNCTAD)Full Report
As a country with 9 different
languages identified as being commonly used, communication strategies
need to vary from district to district. The survey shows that
nation-wide, the language most commonly considered a respondents
mother tongue is Mambae, with 24%, while three others Makasae,
Tetum, and Kemak are accounting for at least 10%. Despite this,
Tetum and Indonesian are identified as the two languages most used by
the literate population to read and Tetum is the language that most
respondents indicate they can speak well.
Mobile phones are also of
growing importance to ICT and development in Timor-Leste. The
survey shows that since 2006, mobile phone ownership has grown by 600
percent, making it the fastest growing communications tool in
Timor-Leste. Although radio is still the highest reaching form
of media and 16 percent of the population is still without access to
any form of media, the use of text messaging for promotions and
campaigns is growing in popularity around the country. The
greatest barriers to use going forward are the cost of mobile phone
services and simply the cost of purchasing a mobile phone.
These barriers, at least at face value, seem much easier to break
than issues of lack of knowledge or lack of coverage in an area.
Read the Full Report(Source: AudienceScapes)
We must remember
that it is not peoples disability that makes it impossible
for them to use certain technologies.
It is the fact
that whoever created the products and services did not take into
account the notion that people are individuals with differing
abilities and preferences, she said in her keynote address at the
launching of a web accessibility seminar. Fatimah said it is vital
that those who design, build, sell and use online information
services or products must understand the impacts on disabled and
older people.
She stated that the Malaysian
Disability Act 2008 has made it mandatory for the government and
providers of information and communication technology to make their
systems accessible to the disabled without any additional costs.
Our focus here is
website accessibility. The federal and state governments have made
web accessibility as one of the mandatory criteria in government
portals and websites, she added.
According to her, the state government
has a web template that complies with the web accessibility
requirements to benefit a wider range of citizens.
The three-day seminar is held to
highlight the importance of making websites accessible to people with
visual disabilities.
It is organised by the state
government, Sarawak Society for the Blind, Sarawak Information
Systems Sdn Bhd (Sains) and National Council for the Blind Malaysia
My message to all those who have
registered for the workshop, learn as much as possible and develop
your websites, services or products that are usable by all.
I hope the
organisers, especially Sains being the ICT total solution provider of
the state government, can work closely with my ministry to promote
web accessibility at national and international levels in the
future, she said.
Also present at the seminar were NCBM
president Datuk S. Kulasegaran, Sains CEO Datuk Teo Tien Hiong,
Sarawak Society for the Blind president Dr Hsiung Kwo Yen and Chief
Ministers Department ICT Unit director William Patrick Nyigor.
(Source: Borneo Post)Further details
"This years
International Day of Rural Women falls at a time of heightened awareness of the
important contribution women are making to social progress.[...] I call on all
partners to recognize the contribution of rural women to our world, and to help
them do even more for our shared future", said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
The first
International Day of Rural Women was observed on 15 October 2008. This new
international day, established by the General Assembly in its resolution 62/136
of 18 December 2007, recognizes the critical role and contribution of rural
women, including indigenous women, in enhancing agricultural and rural
development, improving food security and eradicating rural poverty.
Rural women
play a critical role in the rural economies of both developed and developing
countries. In most parts of the developing world they participate in crop
production and livestock care, provide food, water and fuel for their families,
and engage in off-farm activities to diversify their families livelihoods. In
addition, they carry out vital functions in caring for children, older persons
and the sick.
The theme
for the 56th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (27
February 9 March, 2012) is: "The empowerment of rural women and their
role in poverty and hunger eradication, development and current challenges".
(Source: United Nations Organization)
The National Strategy
"Women Have Rights", which leads the Ministry of
Information and Communications Technologies (MINTIC), the
Presidential Office for Equality for Women, the Presidential Agency
for Social Action and International Cooperation with the support of
the Integral Program Against Gender Violence Fund of the United
Nations and Spain for the achievement of Millennium Development
Goals, aims to help to reduce all forms of violence against women and
especially against women in situations of displacement.
In its first phase "Women
Have Rights" has been proposed change processes for the State
and society and take the new legal environment (Law 1257 and Order
092 from 2008) as an opportunity to move towards a life free of
violence against women, clearly establishing responsibilities and
protocols of care for women victims of gender violence and
This meeting will allow,
through socialization of experiences of mayors, governors and
organizations, that officially have joined to the strategy, joint
actions between the different territories and the national level,
setting goals and challenges to the process of territorial
sustainability of the strategy in the light of the election of new
departmental and municipal governments and define the guidelines for
the construction of the Action Plan 2012.
Also, on October 14
has been set to perform with the participants of the workshop the
meeting of Spokespersons of the Act 1257, developed by the Ministry
of ICT in agreement with the Foundation Women, Art and Life (MAVI) in
different regions of the country.
workshop which is implemented with the video transformation
methodology for the appropriation of the law by public officers,
media and various organizations so, will become spokespeople for
their achievements in various scenarios.
(Source: Mintic
Colombia)Further details
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