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The first monthly magazine on ICT4DVol. III No. 6 June 2005
ISSN
097
2 -
804X
ICT
Polic
y
Information for development
w w w . i 4 d . c s d m s . i n
knowledge for change
Open source softwareStrategic choice for developingcountries
Community radiopolicy in IndiaMixed signals of expectations
ICT policy of EthiopiaChanging positively
knowledge for change
e-Government: Evolution or Revolution?
The e-Government Conferencee
e
2005
e e
ConfluxConfluxConfluxwww.conflux.csdms.in
6
Features
Contents i4d Vol. III No. 6 June 2005
I am a keen follower of developments inICT for development. Your print versionof i4d is of immense interest to me.I would be grateful if my address wouldbe added to your mailing list.
Dr K A RajuNational Institute of Rural Development
I have gone through the i4d website andseen my article and other articles. I wantto show my appreciation for the nice edi-torial touch and layout. I think the maga-zine is great and has a much brighter futureto come. I wish to receive the hard copyof this magazine.
Lawrence Kweku YamuahArmauer Hansen Research Institute
I am impressed by your print magazine,which I received for the first time in Maythis year. I am moved by the features basedon real life experiences in developing worldand how IT is helpful in enhancinglearning. I would like to contributefeatures on ICT4D based on experiencesin East Africa.
Menda. A [email protected]
It will be great if you could send me acomplimentary copy of December 2004issue of your very valuable and informa-tive magazine, i4d.
Dr R K [email protected]
ICT Policy
Perspectives and challenges
Open source software
Strategic choice for developing countries
Francisco J. Proenza
ICT application for businessdevelopment in rural VietnamCreating conducive policy environment
Vu Thi Thanh Huong
Policy study for ruralKarnataka’s ICT projectsIntegrating bits for a bigger biteRashmi Gopal
Community radio policy in India
Mixed signals of expectationsSajan Venniyoor
Map policy of India
Policy for whom?
Ayon Kumar Tarafdar
ICT policy of Ethiopia
Changing positively
Gordon Feller
ICT policy in AfricaChallenge for African governments
PortraitThe Energy and Resources Institute (TERI)
Information technology actNeed for amending
Zooming inProtecting child rights
Books received
Euro-India ICT co-operation,2-3 June, Mumbai, IndiaDevelopment through co-operation
National Workshop on right toinformation act 2005, NewDelhi, IndiaPreparing to implement successfully
Bytes for All
Disaster featureManaging disasters
What’s on
In FactPolicy panorama
12
Columns
16
8
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Researche-Learning projects from India.www.i4d.csdms.in/elearn.asp
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Print editionThe past issues of the magazine are available onlinewww.i4d.csdms.in/archive/archive.htm
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i4d | June 20054
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March 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 5
ICT policy for development
In the last fifteen years, the information and communicationtechnologies for development have evolved rapidly. Thedeveloping countries have started formulating their ICTpolicies only in the last five years or so. But most ICT policiesare solely focused on developing the IT sector and are oftendriven by the vendor interests, thus remaining rather weak onthe development perspectives. Little emphasis is laid onimproving competitiveness of industry in this increasinglyglobalising world. Much emphasis is also not laid on good
governance for improving efficiency, better delivery of citizen services anddeployments that may lead to employment and livelihood support.
The DOT-COM alliance, an USAID project which brings together agencies of thedot-GOV, dot-EDU and dot-ORG sectors, has since 2001, raised the critical elementsthat needs to be taken into consideration in the policy processes especially fordeveloping countries. One critical aspect that has been emphasised is a genderperspective, that can be built into new national policies. Lessons from experiencesof developed and developing nations who have been ahead of others, provide agreat opportunity to get a head start.
The Association of Progressive Communications (APC) is another network that hassupported formulation, assisted the civil society to engage and advocate fordevelopment concerns to be built into ICT policies. Not only has APC providedcommunity platforms for learning and sharing, but also has helped create alliancesand policy watch monitors.
Five key ingredients are necessary to ensure that the disadvantaged, poor and ruralcommunities can take advantage of an information revolution. The first key ingredientis policy environment. This needs to be supplemented by the other four ingredients,viz., infrastructure, education, skills and access.
Whenever countries have engaged in multi-stakeholder participation in their ICTpolicy processes, like in Kenya, Nepal, Sri Lanka, China or India, the policies havefound greater acceptance and have translated into remarkably effective programmesand projects. In this issue, we have presented a development perspective to the ICTpolicy. We do hope that the cases presented in this issue will build the perspectivesof developing countries and provide valuable insights to the international supportorganisations, be it bilateral or multilateral agencies.
We look forward to learning more from governments and civil society in lesserknown or documented countries.
Editorial
Advisory BoardM P Narayanan, Chairman, i4dAmitabha PandeIndian Administrative ServiceChin Saik YoonSouthbound Publications, MalaysiaIchiro TamboOECD, FranceKarl HarmsenCentre for Space Science and TechnologyEducation in Asia and the Pacific, IndiaKenneth KenistonMassachusetts Institute of Technology, USAMohammed YunusGrameen Bank, BangladeshNagy HannaInformation Solutions Group, World Bank, USAS. RamaniResearch Director, H.P.Labs, IndiaWalter FustSwiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, SwitzerlandWijayananda JayaweeraUNESCO, FranceEditorial BoardFrederick Noronha, Akhtar Badshah
Editor Ravi Gupta
Editorial Consultant Jayalakshmi ChittoorSr. Programme Officer Saswati PaikProgramme Officers Anuradha Dhar, Gautam NavinResearch Associates Tanzeena Ghoshe Mukherjee,Sejuti Sarkar DeDesigners Deepak Kumar, Bishwajeet Kumar Singh
Web Programmer Zia Salahuddin
Group DirectorsManeesh Prasad, Sanjay Kumari4dG-4 Sector 39, NOIDA, UP, 201 301, India.Phone +91 120 250 2180-87 Fax +91 120 250 0060Email [email protected] www.i4d.csdms.inContact us in Singapore25 International Business Park,#4-103F, German Centre,Singapore - 609916Phone +65-65627983 Fax +65-656227984
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i4d is a monthly publication. It is intended for those interest-ed and involved in the use of Information and Commnication-Technologies for development of underserved communities.It is hoped that it will serve to foster a growing network bykeeping the community up to date on many activities in thiswide and exciting field.
i4d does not necessarily subscribe to the views expressedin this publication. All views expressed in this magazine arethose of the contributors. i4d is not responsible or account-able for any loss incurred directly or indirectly as a result ofthe information provided.
© Centre for Science, Development and MediaStudies, 2005
Information for development
w w w . i 4 d . c s d m s . i n
Ravi [email protected] is supported by:
i4d | June 20056
The first phase of the World Summit onthe Information Society (WSIS) held inGeneva in December 2003 made acommitment to ‘build a people-centred,inclusive and development-orientedinformation society, where everyone cancreate, access, utilise and share informationand knowledge’. For making this a reality, atransparent and non-discriminatory ICTpolicy is necessary.
During the last 20 years, Informationand Communication Technologies (ICTs)have provided a wealth of new technologi-cal opportunities, with the rapid deploy-ment of both the Internet and cellulartelephony leading the way. These technol-ogies have invaded every country that iswilling to accept them. The most impor-tant differentiating factor now is policy.Policy makes the fundamental differenceregarding how countries are able to takeadvantage of the technological opportuni-ties available to them and exploit them forgood. Countries that have progressivepolicies are seeing these technologies spreadquickly. Conversely, countries that have notbeen able to formulate an integrated ICTpolicy yet have been plagued by slowgrowth of technology and the consequentlessening of support for economic andsocial development.
ICTs are now also an important enablingtools to support the process of development.The full potential of ICT can be realised,and it can be used to maximise the social,economic and environmental benefits of thesociety only if the ICT policies are effective.The policies should contain a particularapproach as to how ICT for developmentwill be achieved and ensure the collabora-tion of stakeholders in government, the pri-vate sector, civil society and internationalorganisations. ICT policies and regulationsare also needed to foster an environment,
conducive to build an ICT infrastructureas well as leveraging ICTs for knowledgecreation and dissemination.
Actors in ICT policy
GovernmentThe government plays the most importantrole in the formulation of ICT policy, andthus, it only decides how countries are ableto take advantage of the technical opportu-nities available to them and exploit themfor good. In the Republic of Korea, forexample, the government took the lead inpromoting development of the Internet. InEgypt, the dynamic Ministry of Commu-nications and Information Technologyplayed a strong role in catalysing telecom-munications development in the country.
Most of the high income countries haveone integrated ICT master plan, wheretelecommunications and IT policies formpart of one development plan. The oldsectoral framework for policy-making basedon broadcasting, telecommunications andinformation technology has now beenshifted to a new layered framework whereall the tools of ICT work cohesively,focusing on social and economic develop-ment. A central bodymay be needed tocoordinate and overseeall policy issues drivingcompetitiveness cen-trally to ensure policycoherence across dif-ferent policy domainsand to make sure thatefforts in some fieldsare not held up bybottlenecks in otherareas.
For this reason,several countries haveestablished high-level
6
ICT POLICY
Perspectives andchallenges
task forces entrusted with monitoringand overseeing the implementation ofintegrated policies for ICTs, such as the ICTtaskforce in Australia and the NationalInformation Technology Council inMalaysia. These task forces are often buildon principles of public-private partnershipand collaboration between government andthe private sector, to ensure that policymaking can respond quickly to firms’ needsand concerns.
Private sectorsAlthough policies are formally put in placeby governments, different stakeholders andin particular, the private sector make inputsinto the policy process and affect itsoutcomes. In the context of globalisedmarkets, large and rich corporations areoften more powerful than developingcountries’ governments, allowing them toshape the policy-making process. WhenMexico was considering adopting freesoftware in its education system, Microsoftoffered fund and free licences to thegovernment, which eventually droppedGNU/Linux and embraced Windowscompletely.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 7
International organisationsInternational organisations also influence thepolicies of the countries. The five organisa-tions that dominate mainstream dialogue onglobal ICT policy issues are:• The International Telecommunications
Union because of its mandate for tele-communications within the UnitedNations system;
• The World Intellectual Property Organ-isation because it is responsible forsetting the rules that govern ownershipof content on the Internet;
• The World Trade Organisation becauseit sets the rules for international trade;
• The World Bank because of the financialand technical resources it brings to bearon development;
• The World Economic Forum because ofits ability to convene the world’s rich andpowerful.
Elements and aspirationsassociatedThe formulation and implementation ofnational ICT strategies that deal effectivelywith the preceding challenges must beparticularly sensitive to two elements:• The need for mechanisms to monitor and
assess ICT readiness, usage and impact;• The need to link ICT policies to other
development policies such as education,trade and health, to allow broad-baseddiffusion of ICT.Uneven diffusion of technology and
inequality in access to technologies are themajor stumble blocks of development.A major challenge for policy-makers at thenational and international level, therefore,lies in addressing the issue of the digitaldivide between rich and poor countries,rural and urban areas, men and women,skilled and unskilled citizens, and large andsmall enterprises. The policy should alsohelp people and organisations to adapt tonew circumstances and technology.
Thus, an ideal ICT policy should try tomeet the following aspirations:• Providing individuals and organisations
with a minimum level of ICT knowl-edge and the ability to keep it up to date;
• Providing information and communica-tion facilities, services and managementat a reasonable or reduced cost;
• Improving the quality of services andproducts;
7
Policies affecting the societyAn ICT policy framework that corresponds to international best practices and standardsprovide the springboard for ICT applications to be used in many sectors to stimulateeconomic growth and improve the quality of life. The policies that affect the followingsectors of society are:
• Students: Policies that address the curriculum reforms and budgetary issues associatedwith the deployment and maintenance of computer systems in educational instituteswill influence the education of the students.
• Underserved community: Policies that address interconnection between land andcellular phone lines, and free market competition often result in an expansion ofcellular phone service at affordable prices. Those traditionally underserved (rural areas,the poor, women, or the elderly) have increased access to telephone service for person-al, health, political, or business needs when cellular service is cheaper and accessible inrural and hard-to-reach areas. Policies that address the allocation of the radio spectrumto include community radio stations can mean an increased number and range oflocally run, locally owned radio, a prime method of communication with rural, largelyilliterate communities.
• Civil society: Policies that allow Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to multiply on themarket can result in a decrease in the cost of Internet access, making e-mail accountsaffordable to local NGOs and other community groups. This increases the efficiencyand networking ability of these groups helping their work to reach their targetpopulations.
• Industries: Clear regulations concerning copyright, intellectual property rights andcyber crime help local ICT industries compete with the international companies.
• Encouraging use of technology andinnovations in technology use;
• Promoting information sharing, transpar-ency and accountability;
• Identifying priority areas for ICTdevelopment;
• Developing new legislations andpolicies according to the need of thedevelopment.
Obstacles aheadThe problems that are associated withthe adequate implementation of ICTpolicies specially in developing countries areas follows:• The government identifies IT as tool for
development but most of the policieslead to sectoral development of IT insoftware rather than focusing on socialinduced development;
• Many countries do not have definitiveNational ICT Development Master Plan;
• There is lack of availability and alsounbalanced distribution of informationand telecommunication infrastructures inmost of the countries;
• Various studies have reported thatpeople’s awareness and knowledge of thebenefits of ICT is considerably low andneeds to be enhanced;
• A major reason of difficulty for thedeveloping countries is their inability tokeep pace with the continuous andrapid speed of ICT innovation anddevelopment.
Need of the hourICT policies need to recognise the abovecaveats and offer ways to overcome theconstraints. Governments, regional organi-sations, and international organisationsresponsible for the formulation and adop-tion of ICT policies are urged to developand adhere to adequately resourced actionplans that designate responsible actors, time-lines, and priorities as appropriate for theparticular circumstances. Political will is alsoan important stimulator of policy decisionand it is stimulated by stakeholder groupsvoicing their needs. These stakeholdersinclude not only the government, but alsothe business sector and civil society groups.An active participation of civil society andthe private sector ensure a strong partner-ship to sustain a policy process. If we wantto promote social justice, then ICT policywill be a key factor in this battle, and wecannot afford to remain outside the ICTpolicy-making process.
Sejuti Sarkar De, [email protected]
i4d | June 20058
Analytical work has firmly establishedthe reliability of open source software aspractical and robust technological platformssupported by sensible business models.Many large companies like Sun Microsys-tems, IBM, Novell, etc. who are directcompetitors of the leading proprietaryvendor have participated in the develop-ment of open source software. Thesecompanies have provided the coordinationand investment resources needed to ensurethat some widely used applications devel-oped under an open source are reliable,sustainable and available across severaltechnological platforms. The companieshave done well because their support ofopen source serves as a viable businessmodel. They are regarded as ‘communityfriendly’ (a powerful form of advertising),and they can make profit on services (e.g.training, technical support) or by sellingenhanced software products.
Some governments are making large scaleall-purpose migrations from proprietary toopen source software. The small Municipal-ity of Extremadura, Spain was perhaps thefirst to make the move and cities likeBergen, Barcelona and Munich followedsuit. Paris considered migration, but givenits strong dependence on proprietarysoftware, opted for a gradual shift to opensource. After many years of recommendingmigration to open source systems in govern-ment desktops, the Government of Brazilappears to be on the verge of issuing apresidential decree mandating migration ofall the computers of its 22 federal ministriesto open source (Linux and FreeBSD)operating systems.
Challenges by type ofapplicationThe choices of the governments ofdeveloping countries regarding software may
Software is subject to network economiesthat makes an application rise in value rap-idly as the number of users increase. Thisleads to winner-take-most markets, where asingle enterprise achieves overwhelmingdominance. Consumers become captive or‘locked’ into a single technology becauseeveryone uses it and because the costs ofshifting and learning to use alternativeproducts are high.
The role of government is to promotecompetition in all markets . The leadingsoftware vendor often bundles features inits software that increase consumer depend-ence and thwart competitors that directlythreaten its dominance. Regulators havesought to level the playing field by impos-ing fines for anti-competitive behaviour andby requiring the sharing of technicalinformation. It will make easier for thecompetitors to connect their desktop appli-cations to the dominant vendor’s servers. Butoften, it is not the effort of regulators butrather the maturing of technology and in-novation in business models that gnaw awaythe leading software vendor’s dominance.
Network effects and technologicallock-in are highest where a significantinvestment in a proprietary technology isalready in place. This is hardly the case inmost developing countries where e-Govern-ment and computerisation is only beginning.The re-training and other transitional costsof moving from proprietary technology to alow-cost open source technology are muchhigher in the US, Australia, Sweden, Koreaor Singapore, where there are over 60 com-puters for every 100 people. In Asia, veryfew countries have even 3 computers per100 people. In most developing countries,the adoption of a national programme canprevent technological lock-in throughselective, judicious and cost-effective use ofopen source software.
OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE
Strategic choice fordeveloping countries
Francisco J. Proenza
Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO),
United Nations, Italy
In most developingcountries, theadoption of anational programmecan preventtechnological lock-in through selective,judicious andcost-effective useof open sourcesoftware.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 9
Table 1. PCs and e-Government indicators:Asia and selected countries
Population Per capita PCs per 2004 Web000 000 GDP 100 people Measure(2003) (US$ 2002) (2003) Ranking
South AsiaBangladesh 135.1 352 0.8 147Bhutan 0.7 734 1.4 165India 1,056.9 494 0.7 30Pakistan 149.6 428 0.4 49Maldives 0.3 2,258 7.1 89Nepal 23.7 237 0.4 66Sri Lanka 19.2 863 1.7 81Asia – PacificAustralia 19.9 20.230 60.2 8China 1,256.9 963 2.8 54Indonesia 215.1 860 1.2 70Korea (Rep.) 48.4 10,014 55.8 4Malaysia 25.2 3,870 16.7 46Singapore 4.2 20,894 62.2 3Thailand 62.5 2,044 3.4 39OtherBrasil 176.0 2,603 7.5 24Canada 31.7 23,417 48.7 7Chile 14.7 4,413 11.9 6Estonia 1.3 4,732 44.0 17Ireland 4.0 31,041 42.1 21Germany 82.5 24,122 48.5 10USA 292.3 36,223 66.0 1UK 58.1 26,369 40.6 2Sweden 9.0 26,864 62.1 13
http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/ict/
be broadly categorised into three major groups:• e-Government portals and service delivery systems;• Desktop office applications;• Community networking and online collaboration software.
A distinction between user requirements is necessary. The mostsuccessful open source systems - Perl, Linux, Apache and PHP areused primarily by information technology specialists who value theability to make changes in the code to suit specialised needs. Manye-Government applications fall in this category. The possibility ofmodifying code is valuable to public agencies developing their on-line service applications. It can enable an agency to share code andcoordinate developments with other agencies, without having toreinvent the wheel or pay hefty proprietary fees.
In contrast, the much larger market for desktop applications –spreadsheets, word processing, presentation, and publishing is madeup of people interested in ease of use and the standard features of anapplication. Their desire or technical capability to alter code is most-ly negligible. Also the costs of shifting from one technological plat-form to another are generally high for users of desktop applications.
Networking and online collaboration software are in a separateclass. This kind of software is important in developing countriesbecause it is through the interaction of people and communitieswith shared interest that the truly empowering effect of computersand the Internet will be realised. Most community group membersare not expert users. They use mailing lists and interact with othersto achieve social and economic objectives, and rely on administra-tors or webmasters to manage the software. The costs of shiftingtechnologies is not an overriding concern to members of the com-munity, but the availability of a system that meets the needs ofmany countries and multiple language requirements and that canbe continuously upgraded at low cost should be of concern togovernments, donors and development agencies.
e-Government systemsPublic intervention in support of e-Government under an opensource platform may be justified on social welfare grounds.
The open source movement has often promoted ‘viral’ licensesthat discourage innovation by preventing subsequent developersfrom making a profit. Software developed under the GPL license,for example, requires that any future developments built from theoriginal software must be distributed freely with full access to thecode. Governments, however, need not follow a restrictive licenseregime. Some licenses enable government agencies to make thesoftware developments they sponsor freely available, but also allowprivate entrepreneurs to use the code and sell improvements undera proprietary license.
Use of open source need not be an all or none proposition.When a wholesale shift in software technology is not practicable,significant economies may still be achieved by sharing selected opensource applications. In the US, the States of Massachusetts, RhodeIsland, Pennsylvania, Utah, Kansas, Missouri, West Virginia, andthe cities of Glaucester, Massachusetts, and Newport News,Virginia, have formed a Government Open Code CollaborativeRepository to enable open source software code sharing by govern-ment agencies. The municipalities of Extremadura and Barcelona,in Spain, and Porto Alegre in Brasil, have established a similar
network to exchange experiences and software developments.A similar initiative has been proposed for the EuropeanCommission (EU).
e-Government efforts have often resulted in ‘data dungeons’that do not interact with each other. These disparate systems residein different agencies and become outdated rapidly. They tend torely on proprietary software that does not conform to open stand-ards; interconnection may be achieved but often at a high cost.
To solve this problem, Great Britain has adopted a flexible opensource policy, developed through a public consultation process.The proposed architecture mandates the use of on open standards,e.g. XML, by all government agencies. Proprietary software is notexcluded, provided that it meets the open standards. Similarly,Brasil’s interoperability architecture (e-ping), envisages theoccasional need to use proprietary software, but will rely mainly onopen source solutions and open standards.
Desktop applicationsTechnological lock-in in desktop applications started in highincome countries when the software industry was still in its infancy.Desktop systems have since become quite sophisticated infunctionality and interoperability. Businesses are resisting
i4d | June 200510
expensive changeovers to new versions that exhibit only minorchanges in functionality. This is especially true of the standardoffice desktop applications – spreadsheet, word processing,presentation and desktop publishing for which robust freedownloads or inexpensive alternatives are available.
The leading open source office suite OpenOffice (www.openoffice.org) may be downloaded for free. It is rich infeatures and its files are readable by other leading vendor officesuites. The new version’s (Beta 2.0) interface is practically the sameas that of the leading vendor. OpenOffice is available in more than70 languages, a feature made easier by free access to the source code.
Because OpenOffice is available in common operating systemplatforms, i.e. Windows, Macintosh, Solaris, Linux, and FreeBSD,the decision to migrate to OpenOffice may be considered apartfrom the decision to change the operating systems. This isimportant for governments considering migrations to open source.The applications on offer are still larger for Windows than for Linuxand problems of compatibility are more serious across operatingsystems. For novice developing country users who only need totype letters, write emails, work on spreadsheets, the basic function-ality of low cost open source solutions that can operate in differentoperating systems is usually adequate.
Since 2001, the city of Sao Paulo, Brazil has run a telecentreprogramme under an open source environment including operat-ing system (Linux) and desktop applications. The city sponsors110 telecentres, all located in the most impoverished parts of themunicipality, showing that inexperienced users can perform well inan open source environment. After an initial trial with dualoperating systems, the city decided to exclusively install the opensource Linux operating system on all of its telecentre computers.This was a crucial strategic choice which aimed purposefully to
avoid technological lock-in to the dominant technology by newusers. Sao Paulo’s programme served as a model for Brazil’snationwide 3,200 telecentre programme, presently under imple-mentation.
Pirate software has been and continues to be commonplace indeveloping countries (Table 2). The basic desktop applications makea very large portion of pirated software. Policing small shopkeepers,cybercafe operators and low-income users using pirated software isimpracticable and politically untenable. Governments are inevita-bly forced to adopt lenient enforcement policies that lead to publiccontempt and lax attitudes towards intellectual property rights thatrun counter to international commercial obligations and end uphurting budding local proprietary software industries.
If governments were to encourage their citizens throughwidespread governmental use in its own offices and projects to usea low cost desktop office application software alternative, thecommon excuse of high cost of software could no longer beregarded as compelling. The real costs of policing intellectual prop-erty rights violations would be lower and could therefore be en-forced more strictly and effectively by focusing on fewer violators.
Community networkingSoftware to establish mailing lists, web pages and enable resourcesharing is a most valuable tool for empowering rural communitiesand encouraging collaboration online.
There are powerful proprietary software options (e.g. First Class,Lyris), some highly specialised (e.g. Blackboard for educationcontent management). There are also open source list servers(PHPList), web page creation programmes (Postnuke) and onlinecollaboration tools (e.g. http://wikipedia.sourceforge.net/, http://www.kolabora.com/, Basic Support for Cooperative Work http://bscw.fit.fraunhofer.de/, etc.). Existing online services like YahooGroups (http://groups.yahoo.com/) and Dgroups (www.dgroups.org)have limited functionality but are presently available for free.
What appears to be missing is an integrated low-cost systemavailable or easily translated into local languages that is suited tofacilitate information exchange and user friendly web page creationby small community groups in developing countries. Such a systemwould have the following features:• The software developed should use open source software, under
a non-restrictive license regime.• The software should enable the use of special fonts (e.g. Sinhala,
Tamil) as well as the corresponding standard fonts to allow avariety of optional languages of communication between users.
• The software should make it possible for community groups,schools, small businesses to have their own distinct uniqueportal shell with its own logo and banner.
• The software developed should be easy to use and run directlyand independently by individual user groups, requiring nointervention of any external institution.
• The software developed should have a separate section forsimultaneous chatting by registered group members, through aWeb page interface within the system.
ConclusionA rapid expansion in e-Government applications is imminent in
The leading open sourceoffice suite OpenOffice(www.openoffice.org) is availablein more than 70 languages.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 11
many developing countries. The present setting offers uniqueopportunities to expand systems rapidly and to avoid duplicationsand locking the country’s e-Government services into proprietarytechnologies that could prove costly. It is an opportunity to bepurposefully seized and planned for.
Most present users of computers in developing countries areEnglish speakers and use proprietary software, but they represent avery small proportion of developing country populations (Table1). For the few well off individuals who use computers, the costs ofshifting to another software technology are high. Yet their viewscarry weight because most decision-makers and governmentofficials fall in this category.
A dependency on proprietary software in desktop systems shouldnot be forced upon the vast majority of people who do not speakEnglish, have no vested interest or training in the dominant tech-nologies, have limited income, and will be the ones to pay the mostif an expensive proprietary software platform is adopted either bydesign or by default by their country’s leaders.
Ultimately, the decision regarding what type of software agovernment agency implements should be dictated by a sober anal-ysis of economic and social considerations. Such a choice should betechnology neutral, as advocated by the leading vendor and theBusiness Software Alliance, but should not be blind to future costsand benefits and should seek to avoid costly technological lock-inon proprietary software technology.
Recommendations• Software developed under developing country government
sponsorship should consider open source solutions, particularlyif these developments are potentially useful to other members ofsociety or to government dependencies. These developmentsshould be subsequently made available for use by third parties(e.g. through an online software code sharing repository), undera license that enables further development and reasonablecommercial exploitation.
• The formation of national Task Forces on open source and inter-operability in e-Government applications bringing togethersenior IT officers from ministries and agencies planninge-Government systems is recommended. The first order ofbusiness should be the drafting of guidelines for the develop-ment, use, and sharing of low cost interoperable applicationsacross public agencies.
• Most people do not need sophisticated office suites, and thefreely available and low-cost desktop alternatives are sturdyenough for widespread country-wide adoption at significantsavings and without having to change operating system.Government sponsored tele-centre, school computerisationprogrammes should consider widespread migration to low-costopen source software.
• The decision to migrate government ICT developmentprogrammes to open source operating systems is more complex.In a developing country, the proposed migration should involvea large number of PCs. Also, because of network effects, if onlya few computers are involved in the change over, the end effectwill be to punish the new users who sooner or later have tomigrate to proprietary standard operating system.
Table 2. Piracy Rate in Asia-Pacific Countries andWorld Wide
Piracy Rate in Asia-Pacific Countries 2004
Country Piracy Rate Country Piracy Rate% %
Vietnam 92 Hong Kong 52
China 90 Korea 46
Indonesia 87 Singapore 42
Pakistan 82 Taiwan 43
Thailand 79 Australia 32
India 74 Japan 28
Philippines 71 New Zealand 23
Malaysia 61 Other 76
Piracy Rate by Region
Region Piracy Rate %
2004 2003
Asia-Pacific 53 53
European Union 35 37
Rest of Europe 61 61
Latin America 66 63
Middle East/Africa 58 56
US/Canada 22 23
All Regions 35 36
Piracy rate: Number of pirated software units divided by total number of units
put into use.
Source: BSA-IDC [2005]
• Apparently, generous offers to supply software to a fewgovernment sponsored tele-centres or school initiatives usuallyignore the large mass of small cybercafe owners and low-incomecomputer users. These offers should in general be resisted bygovernment decision-makers. They are part of a concerted effortfrom the dominant vendor to retain market dominance. Therisks are high that the temporary free provision of the dominantdesktop applications to new computer users will end up lockingthe country into a high cost proprietary software spiral fromwhich it will be increasingly difficult to extricate itself.
• Developing country governments would do well in supportinginternational cooperating bodies made up of academic and civilsociety developing country representatives that set standards foropen source operating systems, as a means of ensuring theirspecial language and font requirements are met and to encour-age development country software development capabilities.
• Government and donors would do well to contribute andsupport the design and implementation of an open sourcecommunity portal and networking software.The light of hope is that the governments of countries around
the globe have started to migrate to open source. This movement isshowing signs of catching up in developing countries of LatinAmerica and Asia. The complete article with references can be read at www.i4d.csdms.in
i4d | June 200512
and recommendations for policy-makingprocess will be drawn for governments,authorities and business managers to pro-mote ICT application and development inbusiness in rural areas. As such, the projectwill have a bottom-up approach in tryingto send a signal from below to the policy-makers and get the response from thegovernment to the need of the peopleand business communities.
Objectives of the project
General objectiveThe general objective of the project is tocontribute to the process of creating the con-ducive policy environment for acceptance,development and application of ICT in ru-ral areas of Vietnam, especially for businessdevelopment.
Specific objectives• To conduct a general assessment of poli-
cy environment, including gaps betweenexisting policy environment and therequired need in ICT application anddevelopment in business in rural areas;
• To assess the readiness of the businessand point out the real problems anddifficulties faced by grassroot businessorganisations in ICT application anddevelopment for business developmentin rural areas;
• To suggest recommendations to thecentral government, ministries, localauthorities and also to the businessmanagers on policies and measures topromote ICT application and develop-ment in business in rural areas.
Research issuesThe project has the following elements asresearch issues:• The role of IT in business activities in
rural areas;
In Vietnam, nearly 75 % of the people livein rural areas. Developing agriculture andrural economy are the most importantorientations of the Government of Vietnam.ICT has been creating not only opportuni-ties but challenges to business in rural areasto narrow the gap between different regions,realise gender equality and the advancementof women to promote sustainable growthand poverty reduction. To promote step bystep development of the rural areas, theVietnamese Government has improved thelegal framework, mechanisms and policieswith a view to create favourable conditionsand offering high preferences for ICTapplication and development in rural areas.
The project ‘Policy and Measures toPromote ICT Application and Deploymentfor Business Development in Rural Areas inVietnam’ aims at investigating factors ofmechanisms, policy environment andmajor measures and their influences on theacceptance and application of ICT inbusiness in rural areas.
To a certain degree, the project willinvestigate problems and difficulties facedby grassroot business, small organisations,Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) andhouseholds in rural or backward areas indealing with the shift to new mode ofeconomic activity and life. The duration ofthe project is 20 months (from July 2004to December 2005). The main responsibleinstitution for the project implementationis the Ministry of Science and Technologyof Government of Vietnam. The projectteam so far consists of the persons fromdepartments of Ministry of Science andTechnology, some government organisa-tions, non-government organisations,Department for Science and Technology ofsome provinces, ICT training centres,universities and enterprises.
As outcomes, a number of conclusions
ICT APPLICATION FOR BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT IN RURAL VIETNAM
Creating conducivepolicy environment
Vu Thi Thanh Huong
Ministry of Science and Technology, Vietnam
The project ‘Policyand Measures toPromote ICTApplication andDeployment forBusinessDevelopment inRural Areas inVietnam’ aims atinvestigating policyenvironment, majormeasures and theirinfluences on theacceptance andapplication of ICTin business in ruralareas.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 13
• Existing status of legal infrastructure related to ICT applicationand development in rural areas;
• The role and relationship of various government departmentswith regard to ICT application and development in rural areas;
• Readiness of business in rural areas for IT application anddeployment - willingness, capacity, problems and difficulties;
• Required policy environment and measures for ICT applicationand development in rural areas;
• Gaps between the current policy and the required one;• Lessons and recommendations to policy makers in central and
local governmental organisations, authorities, and also to thebusiness managers on policy and measures to promote ICTapplication and development in business in rural areas.
Research methodologyThe project has the following activities and the methodology forconducting research in a duration of 18 months, commencing fromJuly 2004 to December 2005:• Inception workshop about ICT application and development
in Vietnam (some issues at stake), especially for business devel-opment in rural areas.
• Assessment of the current state polices and strategies on ICTapplication and development in Vietnam, especially for busi-ness development in rural areas in Vietnam. This includes thefollowing:- Study policies and legal documents on ICT in Vietnam
and related policy documents, strategies, measures for ICTapplication and development in rural areas;
- Carry out an inventory of all goals (explicit and implicit),expectations, plans, strategies related to ICT applicationand development in rural areas;
- Interview officials from about 10 related governmentalagencies and ministries and 15 local authorities to identifyand understand different visions, tendencies and biases inICT application and development in rural areas;
- Organise a seminar to discuss the status of policy environ-ment in relation to ICT application and development inrural areas;
- Produce a report on the status of policy environment.• Collecting foreign experiences in ICT application and develop-
ment in rural areas. This includes collecting and studying policydocuments, strategies, measures for ICT application anddevelopment in rural areas of some countries such as Thailand,China, Canada, Singapore, etc., producing the report on lessonsand experiences that Vietnam can learn and organising aseminar to introduce the study results.
• Conducting a national survey of business enterprises in the ruralareas to assess their role and impacts of ICT on their businessdevelopment. The survey will also assess their needs, readiness,difficulties and impacts of the policy environment for ICTapplication development in business. The purpose of samplingsurvey is to identify research population (business enterpriseswho have access to the Internet in some rural provinces repre-senting the Northern, Central and Southern parts of Vietnam).This population will comprise enterprises operating in differentsectors with differing background, especially SMEs and
households in tradi-tional trade villages.The tasks associatedwith it are- develop-ing survey tool andquestionnaire, con-ducting the surveyand processing thesurvey data, analysisand writing surveyreport.
The other methodolo-gies include:• Conducting 15 in-
depth case studies ofselected enterprises,
• Producing the Na-tional Survey Reportbased on the samplingand in-depth surveys,
• Organising a work-shop to present the survey results,
• Analysing and writing project report,• Final conference for dissemination of the project outcomes,• Upgrading, revising and finalising the final project report based
on the ideas and comments from participants at the finalworkshop for submitting to the authorities and policy makersand preparing for potential publication.
Users and beneficiariesThe project would contribute to the formulation process of allstrategy, policy and master plans to promote ICT application anddevelopment in rural areas of Vietnam. Immediately, the projectresults will contribute to the formulation process of VietnamNational Master Plan in ICT for the period of 2006-2010.
The first immediate users of the study would be the relatedgovernmental bodies, such as Ministry of Science and Technology,Ministry of Post and Telecommunication, Ministry of Justice,Ministry of Trade, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development,local authorities and National Programme on Science andTechnology Application and Deployment for socio-economicdevelopment in rural areas. The recommendations and findings ofthe project would be very useful for them in considering whatoptions may be available, feasible and realistic.
One important benefit of the project is the capacity building forpolicy analysis and decision making of the relevant organisations.This will be the direct outcome of the project to help solvingpolicy-related problems faced by organisations.
Vietnamese companies and households in rural areas would getbenefited from the study. Based on the findings, they could design,adapt and adopt appropriate business strategies and plan of actionsin the most suitable way toward ICT application and deploymentfor business development.
Local communities, grassroots will also benefit from theoutcome of the project, as the IT application and development willimprove their living standards.
Credit: www.terragalleria.com
i4d | June 200514
In addition, foreign donor’s community, researchers and overallpublic could use the study for different purposes like fundingplans, input for further research, awareness raising campaign oreducation and training.
Last, but not least, the project team itself and their associatedorganisations would also benefit from the project. After the com-pletion of the project, research capacity of the members of the teamwill be enhanced and they could exchange their professional expe-riences to each other.
Research activities and research findings• Inception workshop about ICT application and development
in Vietnam was organised in December 2, 2004 especially forbusiness development in rural areas. More than 70 participantsin this workshop were the ICT experts, researchers, policy mak-ers, officers from some ministries, government organisations, non-government organisations, ICT providers with software,hardware and services, ICT training centres and universities andSMEs and households from traditional trade villages in the RedRiver Delta and in the Northern Vietnam. The participantsdiscussed and exchanged views on ICT development in rural
areas, specially in business development. Some recommenda-tions and lessons from consultant groups of other projects willserve as a basis and analytical framework for project studies andactivities.
• Assessment of the current state policies and strategies on ICTapplication and development in Vietnam, especially for busi-ness development in rural areas in Vietnam has been made. Apackage of legal document has been selected and reviewed. Someofficials from provinces and ministries have been interviewedabout visions, tendencies and biases in ICT application anddevelopment in rural areas.
• The policy documents, strategies, measures for ICT applicationand development in rural areas of some countries such as USA,Japan, Thailand, India, Indonesia, China, Australia, Canada,Singapore, UK, France, etc. have been collected and studied.The assessment and research focused on the following issues:- Social and economic impacts of ICT in rural development,
specially the business development;- Challenge in ICT development in rural areas, specially for
business development;- Common barriers to ICT application and development in
rural areas, specially in business development;- Common policy framework;- Common strategies;- Successful initiatives.
• A survey has been conducted to enhance understanding of thelevels of ownership and usage of ICT by Vietnamese businessacross all their business processes and also to highlight areas ofrelative strength and weakness of ICT application across SMEs.
Survey findingsThe survey findings are as follows:• Only 30% of the registered enterprises are located in rural areas
(58/61 provinces). Most businesses in rural areas are micro busi-nesses (0-9 employees), small businesses (10-49 employees) andonly few medium businesses (50-249 employees).
• The ICT application and deployment in business in rural areasare still backward. Only few business return the surveyquestionnaire sent by mail to them, which means that theydon’t care much and are not interested in the issues of ICTapplication in business.
Credit: Yves Beaulieu, IDRC, 2003
Participatory policy making in Nepal
In 1999, the Nepal’s Planning Commission supported by the Canada based International Development Research Centre (IDRC),started an innovative process of ICT policy making. The process began with the constitution of the National Information TechnologyDevelopment Working Committee and IT Policy Sub-committee under it. Leading IT professionals, the industry and leaders in thefield of education and telecommunications were invited to share their own vision for a ‘connected and vibrant’ Nepal. Three areas ofcritical importance were identified - universal access to information technology, education and training and IT applications in businessand government. The next step in the process was the formation of consultative groups on universal access to IT, on ICT infrastructuredevelopment, on human resources development, on software and services, on electronic commerce and on electronic governance. Eachgroup chose experts as the leader and chose their own paper writer. These papers were carefully studied to see how government couldmake these strategies a success. This led the drafting of the IT Policy, which was publicly debated by the academia, government, media,researchers, civil society and the industry. Within a year of the steering of this process, the Government of Nepal adopted therecommendations and approved its Information Technology Policy in October 2000.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 15
GIS InstitutePage 15 Ad
• The survey group has spent time to do the interview in personwith businesses in 3 traditional trade villages in the north ofVietnam and here are some results:- 100% of the businesses in the selected villages have
telephone lines;- The villages closer to capital city Hanoi have better ICT
applications both in households and busineeses;- Most of the computers used are made in Vietnam;- The software mostly used are Microsoft’s MS Word and
Excel and some Vietnamese software on accounting;- Dial-up modems are the main means of connection for SMEs
in rural areas;- Businesses are more likely to use ICT to obtain the informa-
tion than to provide information;- Businesses expressed the main areas of concern to be set-up
and running cost of ICTs and lack of ICT skill of their staff;- Among those businesses that don’t use computers, the main
reason is that they don’t see it as beneficial for their businessand believe that they do not have the technology in place todo so and so they prefer to deal face to face;
• The main reason for not using e-mails is that they don’t seea need or feel it as appropriate for their business and preferface to face or telephone contact;
• The website is not used enough because of the lack of use ofInternet by their customers, the cost involved, lack of skillsof the staff and also they think that it is not of benefit fortheir type of businesses;
• They avoid online payment as they are concerned aboutsecurity and fraud;
• Begger businessmen are making more sophisticated use ofICTs than their smaller counterparts;
• Technical infrastructure is poor and technical level differsamong businesses in the different regions in the countries;
• There is not much information sharing and informationcontent in networks and websites are still weak;
• There is lack of legal environment to encouragenon-state sector, specially private SMEs in ICT use anddevelopment;
• There is inequality in accessing to IT knowledge betweenrural, remote areas and urban areas, between men andwomen and also between people in different regions andbusiness groups.
Key lessons learned• ICT has vital role in connecting the rural community to outside
world, specially in business development;• The government should issue strategies, policy and measures to:
- Reduce inequality in opportunities to access to ICT,- Formulate and implement programmes to support ICT use
and ICT development in rural and remote areas,- Raise awareness on IT use and development in rural areas,
specially in business,- Create favourable legal environment for IT use and
development in rural areas, especially in businessdevelopment,
- Mobilise funding resources for all these targets.• ICT activity comprises of two proponents - ICT infrastructure
and application software:- The government should take partial responsibility to the
cost of ICT establishment in rural areas. Alternatively, thegovernment may encourage key players in ICT and financeindustry to co-invest in ICT development,
- The construction of ICT infrastructure should be basedupon local needs and actual circumstance and also onworkable technology at affordable price,
- Software localisation should be encouraged,- Relevant information should be available in local language.
ConclusionIt is evident that people who work in businesses that include ICTare facing problems in their business planning. Successful ICTprojects must come from the business’s overall strategic planningprocess and should have clear measures of costs and benefits.Successful implementation of ICT projects relies on the top leadersof the business and organisation.
The ICT application and
deployment in grassroot business
in rural areas is still backward.
i4d | June 200516
especially for the rural market, corporateorganisations providing ICT services for therural community, nationalised banksproviding micro-credit services and NGOsworking on rural ICT initiatives. It alsoincluded infrastructure providers andfinanciers (power and telecom).
Detailed discussions were held withsenior personnel in these organisations onthe nature of the initiative, its objective,geographical coverage, its current status andbeneficiary profile, expansion plans, effortsinvolved in implementing these initiatives,problems faced and sustainability andreplicability of the initiative.
The project team also met private entre-preneurs working towards providing abasket of services to the rural communityby taking up a franchise of a governmentinitiative.
Two villages where the people have someaccess to ICT initiatives were surveyed andselected so that the people would have abetter understanding of ICT applicationsand would therefore be able to state theirneeds clearly.
Based on all these discussions andsurvey findings, recommendations onpolicy and systems for maximising thebenefits of service delivery through ICTswere drafted. These were discussed with thevarious stakeholders during a workshop andtheir suggestions were analysed and incor-porated into the final recommendations.
Major ICT initiatives acrossrural KarnatakaWhile there are many ICT initiatives in thestate, some of the major ones are detailedbelow.• BHOOMI: The Bhoomi project, imple-
mented by the Department of PublicAdministration and Revenue (DPAR),makes available a computerised Record
Rural Information and CommunicationTechnology (ICT) projects could prove tobe an effective mean of driving social, eco-nomic and political change in the rural are-as. Despite Karnataka leading India’s ITdrive, the many ICT initiatives implement-ed in the rural parts of the state have notbrought about any radical change in servicedelivery to this section of society.
Currently, rural Karnataka’s ICT scenar-io is dotted with a large number of inde-pendent pilot projects, with most modelsbased on subsidy schemes. Plans for anyrural ICT initiative should primarily look atthe economic viability of the initiative.Given the low population density in com-parison to urban areas and the restrictedpaying capacity of a large percentage of therural community, this is a challenge.
This challenge could be overcome ifmultiple service providers and enablerscollectively adapt their service deliverymechanisms to create a profitable model,giving the rural community a combinationof ICT based services. This combination ofservices should have a regional orientationand should benefit them to an extent thatthey are willing to pay the stated price.
There are currently no systems andpolicies to facilitate and bring about thismuch needed integration of ICT initiativesacross the state.
ApproachICT initiatives across rural Karnataka werecompiled using various resources. Thirty sixorganisations were short listed includingfourteen government departments. Theseincluded application providers from thesectors pertaining to agriculture producemarketing, public administration andeducation. Among the short listed organisa-tions, there were also companies involved inresearch and manufacture of ICT equipment
POLICY STUDY FOR RURAL KARNATAKA’S ICT PROJECTS
Integrating bits for abigger bite
Rashmi Gopal
Vangala Krishna
Ashwin Sabapathy
P.Chakravarty
The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI),
Bangalore
Despite Karnatakaleading India’sIT drive, the manyICT initiativesimplemented in therural parts of thestate have notbrought about anyradical change inservice delivery tothis section ofsociety.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 17
of Rights, Tenancy and Crops (RTC) to all landowners at a kioskin the taluka (sub-district administrative units) office, on pay-ment of $0.25 (approx.) per RTC. In recent times, the DPAR ispromoting private franchise models in which the franchiseeshave to bear the cost of the infrastructure and Internetconnection. They can charge $0.3 to $0.5 (approx.) per RTCagainst the $0.25 charged at the taluka office. This is oneinitiative that has the capability of breaking even on Operationand Management (O&M) costs, primarily because of theessential nature of the service and the volumes (each landownerrequires atleast one set of certificates per year and has to take asmany certificates as the number of survey numbers in which hehas landholdings).
• The Education department has three parallel ICT programmesfor rural schools.a. The ‘Mahiti Sindhu’ programme addresses computer
education for high school (Std VIII, IX, X) students andteachers in 1000 schools of Karnataka. Each of the 1000schools have been provided anywhere between six tofifteen computers with power backup, a printer and basicsoftware. Internet connectivity is available and a person hasbeen appointed in each school to impart computereducation.
b. In association with the Azim Premji Foundation (APF), theEducation Department is creating Computer AssistedLearning Centres (CALCs) in government primary schoolsacross the state. APF makes a range of multi-lingual CDs toassist primary school children in grasping their curricularsubjects (computer aided education). Each CALC has 4-5computers, a printer and UPS.
c. Intel has tied up with the Education Department to imparttraining to teachers to innovatively use computer technolo-gy to enhance student learning in the 1000 schools underthe ‘Mahiti Sindhu’ programme.
Apart from these, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)has recently launched a satellite dedicated to education services.800 government primary schools in Chamarajanagar district havebeen selected for the pilot implementation of an interactivedistance education project. Each school has got one computer andsatellite connectivity.• The Department of Agricultural Marketing regulates market
practices for agricultural commodities. Quantities and prices ofagricultural produce traded in the different markets are availableon a website that is updated daily. 112 of the 145 AgricultureProduce Market Communities (APMCs) have a computer whichcan be accessed by farmers to see the daily prices of theagricultural commodities.
• The Asia Heart Foundation has set up telemedicine linksbetween a premier cardiac hospital and 23 hospitals across thecountry, ten of which are in Karnataka. Each telemedicineconsulting centre has 2 computers and power back up. Thehospitals are connected through ISDN fibre-optic lines or VSATlinks. Sustainability is a key issue especially when looking atreplicating this initiative across district hospitals and primaryhealth centres in the state. As in education, the government isconsidered responsible for providing these services, free of cost.
• The Safal Fruit and Vegetable Auction Market (SFVAM) ofNational Dairy Development Board has set up 100 farmers’associations or collection centres, for auctioning of fruits andvegetables. The associations are being given a computer andrequired communication infrastructure in a phased manner.
FindingsICTs have made considerable inroads into Karnataka’s villages. De-spite this, the study found that awareness about the potential forusing ICTs and the stated need is limited. Children’s education andprocurement of government forms are considered the two mostuseful applications and people are ready to pay for these services.They are also open to paying a nominal fee for access to betterhealth services and for awareness on health issues. The villagersshowed interest in utilising the ICT infrastructure for entertain-ment purposes. It is necessary to have public participation, so thatthe system is sustainable irrespective of the budget allocations andtherefore replicable.
Private entrepreneurs are also only aware of some of the com-mon applications. They need capacity building and networkingassistance to be able to offer a larger number of required services.NGOs can play a vital role in driving change in their geographicalarea of work.
Discussions showed that ICT equipment installed by a serviceprovider is used only for one specific application and since volumeof transactions are low there is sub-optimal utilisation of installedinfrastructure. In the surveyed villages, it was found that within a10 km. radius, there are 30 computers with 7 printers and adequatepower backup, 3 trained computer teachers and a number of youngpeople trained in basic computer packages. These computers areused for imparting education to approximately 500 students andgenerating an average of 500 RTCs a month. It can comfortably bedone with less than half the currently available resources.
Discussions with private entrepreneurs who have taken up afranchise for the ‘Bhoomi’ kiosk stated that their average monthlyexpenses on Internet connectivity, electricity, space rental and help-er’s salary are $70 (approx.). Apart from this, the entrepreneur hastaken a loan to invest in the hardware and software amounting to$1300 (approx.). Monthly outgoing is approximately $85,excluding profits for the entrepreneur himself. The major revenuegenerator currently is the issuing of RTCs, giving annual revenues
i4d | June 200518
of around $135 to $210. This revenue is not enough to sustainprivate enterprise.
The DPAR charges $0.25 for each RTC. Private entrepreneursare allowed to charge upto $0.25 extra per RTCs. Most villagershave lands in multiple survey numbers, so they require multipleRTCs. If a village is close to the taluka office, the villagers prefer toget their RTC from the taluka office. Discussions with the villagersand private entrepreneurs showed that it is far easier getting anRTC from the taluka office than from the private entrepreneur,with the latter requiring signatures from village accountants whoare not always present in the village. This drastically reducesbusiness opportunities for the private entrepreneurs.
Moreover, it was found that there are multiple franchisees forthe ‘Bhoomi’ project in close proximity to one another. It is betterto handhold a few franchisees in specific locations until there isenough usage of ICT based service to allow competition to flourish.
Not only is there no inter-sectoral integration, a lack ofintra-sectoral integration was also evident in the schemes run by theDepartment of Education, which has installed substantialinfrastructure under three parallel schemes. Fear of misuse by otherusers prevents those responsible from allowing it to be used for anypurpose other than that stated and therefore computers installedfor providing education to high school children are not being usedby primary school children and vice-versa.
The non availability of electricity through most of the day in thevillages is a major bottleneck. Every service provider has providedpower back-up infrastructure for operating the systems for amaximum of four hours, which is not adequate.
One must understand that while computer technology and theInternet provide large opportunities, many are not yet comfortablewith it. This is primarily due to low literacy levels and that manyapplications are text-based and the text is not in the local language.The prices of agricultural commodities are rarely accessed byfarmers on a website, but the same information, if sent as amessage to a village resource centre where it is printed anddisplayed, will be read by far more people. Such information couldalso be sent through the mobile phones to customers on request.Television and radio are established communication technologiesand in the recent past the usage of mobile phones in rural areas hasgone up considerably.
Policy recommendationsIn view of the above, it is recommended that –
Private enterprise which can deliver a basket of services tailored tolocal needs be promotedPrivate enterprise can deliver a combination of ICT based servicestailored to the needs of the community more efficiently than anyindividual service provider with a fixed mandate. It is thereforerecommended that the government bring in policy to promoteentrepreneurship for delivery of ICT based services. It is also recom-mended that Self Help Groups (SHGs) be promoted to take onentrepreneurship instead of individuals since they are an entityrecognised by the government and by the villagers. Among otheradvantages of going the SHG way, delivery of multiple serviceswould also require multiple people for certain time periods, whichcan be handled by the SHGs.
It is advisable to have a central village resource centre, preferablyone for every two villages. The computer infrastructure may beplaced in this resource centre. One SHG from each village can betrained in operating and maintaining the infrastructure andapplications. The centre and its infrastructure can be theresponsibility of the gram panchayats (village level administrativeunits). If the centre were to provide RTCs and other governmentforms, education to children and youth, computerise SHG accounts,arrange for interactive health camps and awareness programmes,provide market and other agri-related information, as well asprovide entertainment and facilities such as digital photography, allon a payment basis, a financially viable model can be arrived at.Services specific to local needs can also be provided and only 4-5computers would be adequate to provide all the above.
To handhold the private entrepreneurs until sufficient volumesare achieved, a model where services are delivered only throughprivate franchisees and not from individual government offices canbe looked at.
Capacity of change drivers be builtIt is suggested that the government puts in place a programme forcapacity building of private franchisees and NGOs, not just on thesoftware applications but on the potential benefits and use of ICTsystems as well as maintenance of ICT hardware.
Critical infrastructure issues and sector specific backward linkagesfor promoting the use of ICT be addressedThe government should intensify its literacy programme andensure that application user interfaces are either in the locallanguage or multi-lingual.
Business models that further encourage the adoption ofrenewable energy devices may be beneficial for the spread of ICTdriven services. The government could also promote research whichlooks at reduction in power consumption.
Corporate participation be promotedThe government could initiate a policy that encourages corporateorganisations wanting to introduce ICT driven services to the ruralpopulation either as a business objective or as a Corporate SocialResponsibility (CSR) initiative.
Institutional mechanismsTo look into the above recommendations and oversee the imple-mentation, it is recommended to set up an apex body that can lookat implementation of rural ICT initiatives holistically. This apexbody will need to ensure that issues pertaining to integration intechnology and implementation are also given due thought. Theapex body can be spearheaded by the Department of InformationTechnology and Bio-Technology (IT&BT), The other membersof the apex body can be drawn from (a) the Department of PublicAdministration and Revenue which currently forms the backbonefor a private enterprise delivering services through ICTs and (b)Rural Development and Panchayat Raj (RDPR) department.
There is also need for local level institutions driven by the grampanchayat members that can fine-tune the guidelines put forth bythe apex body to specific local requirements and facilitate imple-mentation by bringing in synergies between the service providers,users and other facilitators.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 19
Amidst media reports that India’s newcommunity radio policy is on the verge ofbeing sent for Cabinet approval, the finalstage of policy making, there are slight fearsamong community radio groups that thepolicy may not quite live up to theirexpectations. There has been intensespeculation about the policy ever sincethe broadcast regulator, the TelecomRegulatory Authority of India (TRAI)(www.trai.gov.in) submitted its recommen-dations on community radio to theGovernment of India in December 2004.But community radio has been a matter ofheated debate long before TRAI, in anunprecedented move, issued a consultationpaper and held open house discussions onthe subject late last year.
It was ten years ago, on December 9,1995 that the Supreme Court handed downits historic judgement on the airwaves, stat-ing, “Airwaves constitute public propertyand must be utilised for advancing publicgood.” A year later, a group of policy plan-ners, media professionals and civil societyorganisations gathered in Bangalore to studyhow community radio could be relevant inIndia. A ‘Bangalore Declaration’ was signed,which has formed the basis of advocacy forcommunity radio since then. Many meet-ings, workshops and conferences were tofollow, including one in Hyderabad andPastapur (Andhra Pradesh) in July 2000,which urged the government to create athree-tier structure of broadcasting in India- state-owned public radio, private commer-cial radio, and non-profit community radio.
Community radio has three key aspects:non-profit making, community ownershipand management, and community partici-pation. As community groups have definedit, “Community radio is distinguished byits limited local reach, low-power transmis-sion, and programming content that reflects
COMMUNITY RADIO POLICY IN INDIA
Mixed signals ofexpectations
Sajan Venniyoor
Doordarshan, New Delhi
Amidst mediareports thatIndia’s newcommunity radiopolicy is on theverge of being sentfor Cabinetapproval, there areslight fears amongcommunity radiogroups that thepolicy may notquite live up totheir expectations.
the educational, developmental and cultur-al needs of the specific community it serves.”
In December 2002, the Ministry ofInformation & Broadcasting released its‘Community Radio Guidelines’ (www.mib.nic.in). To community radio groups,who had been expecting a break-through,these guidelines were a major disappoint-ment. The guidelines restricted communityradio licenses to ‘well-established’ education-al institutions. News and current affairsprogrammes were banned, and advertise-ments, which would have brought in somemuch needed revenue were also prohibit-ed. The licensing process proved so cum-bersome that the first campus-basedcommunity radio (CR) station in India –Anna University’s ‘Anna FM’ came up onlyin February 2004, and fewer than 10 cam-pus stations have started broadcasting so far.
In a tacit acknowledgement of the limit-ed success of its campus radio guidelines,the Information & Broadcasting Ministryorganised a workshop in May 2004 inDelhi to design an ‘enabling framework forcommunity radio in India’. The workshopbrought together a large number ofcommunity radio enthusiasts, NGOs andpolicy makers, who worked out a set ofrecommendations for a new communityradio policy, one that would allow commu-nity groups to run their own radio stations.
The participants agonised over manyissues while making their recommendationsfor community radio, walking a difficulttightrope between the desirable and thefeasible. They were all too painfully awarethat the government had its own set ofconcerns about community radio, not theleast of which was a perceived threat tonational security.
What should be the eligibility criteria forlicensees? Should the government adoptnon-eligibility criteria and consider the claims
i4d | June 200520
of all legal entities with the exception of political parties, religiousgroups and banned organisations? Would a 100-watt transmitterserve the needs of all geographically bound communities? Whatabout the villages of, say Kutch, which would require very power-ful transmitters to reach just a few scattered settlements? Couldpolitical news be permitted on community radio? (“What’snon-political?,” shot back a CR activist, “In our villages, evendigging a well is political!”) And how much advertising could belegitimately permitted on a community radio station? “None at all”,thundered the purists. But others want unlimited amount. TRAIrecommends 5 minutes per hour.
The May 2004 workshop and the government’s draft CRpolicy based its recommendations by addressing these concernsmeticulously and equitably. When TRAI held its consultation laterthat year, it came as no surprise when they arrived at much the sameformulations for community radio.
From press reports following the recommendations of the Delhiworkshop and the TRAI consultations, it is clear that the govern-ment has drafted a community radio policy that addresses the threemain concerns of community radio groups:• permitting communities through NGOs and other legal entities
to set up their own radio stations;• allowing community radio to broadcast local news;• allowing the stations to sustain themselves through advertising
revenue.The licensing procedure is also being simplified, although a
single-window clearance for CR licenses may prove difficult toachieve. The other terms and conditions including technical speci-fications are not likely to be very different from the existing campusradio guidelines.
While drafting these genuinely liberal provisions for communi-ty radio, neither the government nor the community radio groupswere re-inventing the wheel. Many of the recommendations weredrawn from the best provisions in the CR policies of countries likeAustralia, Ireland, Canada and South Africa, which have some ofthe most successful community radio movements in the world.Even in South Asia, India has been a laggard in permitting commu-nity radio. Nepal and Sri Lanka have thriving community radio
Credit: Yves Beaulieu, IDRC, 2003
“Community radio isdistinguished by its limited localreach, low-power transmission,
and programming content thatreflects the educational,
developmental and cultural needs
of the specific community ...”
initiatives for years. Indeed, the entire radio scenario in India israther depressing. Governed by archaic laws (Indian Telegraph Act,1885), radio in India has never lived up to its potential, with barely260 radio stations in a country of a billion people. Our Asian neigh-bours have hundreds of radio stations, like Thailand with over 700stations, and Indonesia with over a 1000. Even tiny Philippineshas 350 radio stations, with 90 percent of them in private hands.
Not surprisingly, these countries also have thriving communityradio movements. The Frequencies Act of 2000 in Thailand, forinstance, assigns 20 percent of radio frequencies to communitybroadcasting. Some 190 community radio stations are recognisedby the Thai government, Indonesia has several hundred CR sta-tions, since many of them operate in a legally grey area. East Timorhas at least 16 CR stations. Nepal, in spite of Radio Sagarmatha andits successors, does not have a separate CR policy.
India, on the other hand, has just a few scattered CR initiatives,like ‘Kunjal Panchchi Kutchji’, a community radio programme pro-duced by the Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan and broadcast fromAIR Bhuj and Rajkot; ‘Chala ho Gaon Mein’, broadcast on AIRDaltongunj in Jharkhand; ‘Namma Dhwani’ in Budhikote, Karna-taka, which uses a co-axial cable and loudspeakers to ‘narrowcast’ itsprogrammes and the Pastapur initiative, where the Deccan Devel-opment Society uses cassette tapes to distribute their programmes.Other initiatives have come up in Jharkhand, Gujarat (Self-Em-ployed Women’s Association’s ‘Rudi no Radio’) and Uttaranchal,but none of them are permitted to run their own community sta-tions. In fact, the only true community radio experiment in inde-pendent India, the Oravakal Community Radio in Andhra Pradeshran into rough weather soon after it went on air on October 2,2002, and was closed down by the government within four monthsfor operating without a license.
India’s community radio policy has been slow to evolve, and theend is not yet in sight. But as a Ministry official said to me when Ispoke enviously of the community radio stations in neighbouringNepal, “Yes, but look at the their CR stations now. They have allbeen closed down quite ruthlessly. Our CR policy may take a whileto develop, but when it does, you know it will be good and it willserve you well for a long time.”
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 21
Relevance of information in‘collective decision-making’Development strategies always have a col-lective ‘well-being’ rather than an individu-al ‘well-being’ at its core. So any planningprocess or strategies taken by any organisa-tion (State or Corporate) need to have astrong sense of rationality. While decentral-isation is a ‘process’, which enhances ration-ality, ‘information’ is the important ‘tool’ thatmakes this happen. Spatial or geographicinformation is a very important componentof ‘information’ as a whole when it comes todevelopment planning. In developingcountries, the domain of ‘development’ andof ‘technology’ - more specifically geospa-tial information and communicationstechnologies - are conceptually complimen-tary but practically yet to be fused. InIndia, a vast amount of geographic data andaccurate maps exist. However, very few peo-ple have access to it as it remains locked inthe hands of the experts or specialiseddepartments. The cases of actual utilisationof this information in planning and devel-opment process have been only handful.What is the reason behind such a scenario?While one key reason for this is the lack ofawareness about the available tools, perhapsa larger reason lies in the policy frameworkof the land. This paper attempts to delveinto the Indian set-up and bring out anopinion of how possibly the present policyframeworks affected information flow andits tryst with development.
Spatial information and itstryst with Indian ‘Policy’India has a rich history of mapping andgenerating geographic information. TheIndian geodetic control network is perhapsone of the best in the world. The geodeticdata, collected through centuries ofdedicated efforts including the Great Trigo-nometrical (G.T.) Triangulation Network ofIndia has resulted in a huge repository ofdata of the country, lying with a 230 oldpremier mapping agency – Survey of India
MAP POLICY OF INDIA
Policy for whom?
Ayon Kumar Tarafdar
GIS Development, India
The cases of actualutilisation ofgeospatialinformation inplanning anddevelopmentprocess have beenonly handful. Thispaper attempts todelve into theIndian set-up andbring out anopinion of howpossibly the presentpolicy frameworksaffected informationflow and its trystwith development.
(SoI). Other than the detailed topographicdata, there are the Satellite Survey ControlNetwork, the High Precision, Precision andSecondary Levelling Network, the LaplaceStations Network, the Gravity Stations Net-work, the Tidal Stations Network and theGeomagnetic Stations Network.
The organisations with a mandateThere is large number of organisations thatuse geographic data on a regular basis fortheir work and also have the mandate toprepare relevant maps. Forest Survey ofIndia, Central Water and Power Commis-sion, Directorate of Mining and Geology,Geological Survey of India, DefenceOrganisations, Soil Survey Department,Mineral Corporations, Indian Bureau ofMines, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation,Atomic Mineral Division, Indian SpaceResearch Organisation, National RemoteSensing Agencies, are some of such mandat-ed organisations. Other than these, theUniversity Departments of Geology,Agriculture, Geography, Sociology, Archae-ology, Research Organisations dealingwith Earth Science and related subjects,Planning Departments, Statistical Institutes,Environmental Organisations, are key usersof such data.
But is that all? We perhaps are leavingaside a much larger proportion of thepopulation, i.e., the common man. Com-mon man referring to the ones engaged inprivate sector and civil societies who do notbelong to the government departmentsholding the key to such data. The questionis, how do they get access to the data andwhat about the data they produce.
In essence, a huge amount of maps orrelated data for the country till date is re-stricted for the common man, or subject tomultiple clearances. The history behind thiscan be traced back to the Colonial BritishGovernment in India who introduced thecode of security by a rule that surveyors ofSoI should treat their work as top secret.However, things are different now, exceptthe restriction policy.
i4d | June 200522
The restriction policyAccording to the prevalent policy of restriction of maps andtoposheets, all topographical and geographical maps of areas (ofabout 80 km) between the delineated line, shown on the ‘Index toToposheets’ published by the Survey of India, and the land border,and also of similar maps of Bhutan and Sikkim, and similar maps ofthe outlying islands viz, Andaman and Nicobar, and LakshadweepIsland comprising Laccadiv, Minocoy and Amindivi, on scales of1:1 million and larger, are restricted and their sale, publication anddistribution are governed by separate set of rules. This was laiddown in the late 1967 and further amended in the early 1968 bythe Ministry of Defence, Government of India. Hence, in actuality,some 227 out of 385 toposheets remain restricted. In area terms,only about 43 percent of India is un-restricted. For the rest of themaps, application has to be made on a special form obtainable fromSurvey of India and issue of such maps is subject to series ofconditions mentioned in the form. In 1971, clearance of Ministryof Defence was made compulsory for issue of restricted maps toprivate individuals, organisations and commercial firms. Not onlythat, it was also a practice that persons receiving ‘restricted’ mapshave to submit an annual certificate of safe custody of such maps.
The implicationsGradually, the impediment to progress started getting felt atdifferent levels. Aerial photographs for the entire country areclassified as secret/top secret. As other countries have developedahead, we carried on with the same rules despite the fact that thesephotographs are an important tool for research workers in cartogra-phy, environmental studies, geological interpretation, planning anddevelopment.
It is understandable that much of the geodetic data is of strategicimportance. But the situation for every country in the developedworld is similar. And it is technology that has the answer of how todifferentiate between the same data in a manner that one seriesbecomes security sensitive and another becomes open for all. Withthe advent of ICT and Internet boom, availability of many of theserestricted maps over Internet from sources outside the nation hasbecome a common thing. Finally, after 58 years of independence,the government has announced a revolutionary upcoming changeto happen.
A new eraIn a government Press Conference on 19th May 2005, it came outthat the Union Cabinet of the Government of India has given itsapproval to the new National Map Policy brought out by theMinistry of Science and Technology.
The New Policy envisages two series of maps- the Defence SeriesMaps (DSMs) and the Open Series Maps (OSMs). The DSMs willbe for exclusive use of defence forces and authorised governmentdepartments. The Ministry of Defence will determine the policyregarding the use of DSMs whereas the Policy on OSMs will be theresponsibility of Survey of India/Department of Science and Tech-nology. OSMs will have a different datum, projection, content andsheet numbers. These maps will be derived from National DigitalTopographical Database (NDTB), which will be created by theSurvey of India. The use of OSMs will be through a process of
registration for intimation. There will be a Map Information Regis-try Database (MIRD). 1:1 million and smaller maps do not requireregistration. OSMs (Digital or Analogue) can be disseminated bySurvey of India, through an agreement to any agency for specificend use. The user can make value addition to these maps and canshare the information under initiations to the Survey of India.
It was also mentioned that all aerial photographs after maskingof Vulnerable Areas/Points would be freely available for processingand project generation. Private agencies will be permitted to carryout surveys in all parts of the country using Public Domain Datum.But they should be registered and should carry the accreditation ofSurvey of India. Magnetic/gravity and other scientific data will becollected and disseminated as per existing instructions.
Policy for whom?The point here that emerges is - who is this policy aimed at. Is it thedepartment of the government and again the same expert commu-nity who deals with maps or the common man? Of course one lineof thoughts will argue that it is for the common man. It is thecitizens who will be positively affected with unrestricted flow ofinformation. If maps become unrestricted, development shall betriggered.
However, another line of thought can be that, most of this isonly about the available maps of SoI, which were restricted. Or inother words, this policy is about the policy maker, in this case thegovernment arm of SoI. The policy can be said to assume that theonly source of maps is SoI and some other government departmentsand hence is all about enhancing the accessibility from this singlesource. It remains silent about the rest of the players even if theyhave the capacity of producing maps or have produced maps overtime like the private sector. What about the huge amount of mapsand spatial data that the private sector has invested in and devel-oped over the years indigenously? And what about the types andscales of data, which are still not available from SoI? What aboutallowing the private or semi-private domains? Does the policy de-restrict generation of spatial data?
Further, in current times, the use of satellite and space sciences isindispensable in spatial data creation and updating. The mentionof space data and its restriction policy seems hazy or null. Hence,the question of an impending discrepancy of topographic dataaccessibility and space-based data accessibility emerges. Can therebe not an interdepartmental collaborative policy?
Finally, the policy announcement does anticipate a revolutionof the industry, but does it spell out the way in the un-restricteddata shall be finally used by common man?
In the current times, with Internet and ICT applicationsexploding, and with mobile telephony picking up at a rate of over150 percent growth per annum in Asia, the scope and potential forapplications that demand spatial information is huge. It is just amatter of time before the market devises and internalises methodsof alternative routes to get hold of data, both satellite based ortopographic, in their workflows. Hence, it is time the market is letfree and also capitalised upon.
The policy is yet to be out in the public domain and hence wecan hope for the best about all the above factors. Perhaps all theanswers are there in it. Its a matter of time and faith.
23June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in
e-Governance
Welsh Assembly introduceswebsite on Work-Life BalanceWelsh Assembly Minister for Education
and Lifelong Learning, Jane Davidson,
recently, launched the http://www.
wlbinwales. org.uk website, which aims to
provide free information, advice and guid-
ance on Work-Life Balance to employers,
employees, unions and the general public.
The launch of the website is said to be
one of the key strands to the Welsh As-
sembly government’s policy for more
effective work-life balance for employers
and employees in Wales promoting the
benefits of work-life balance and commu-
nicating those benefits across the public,
private and voluntary sectors in Wales.
Source: http://www.publictechnology.net
Dubai Municipality gets BestMiddle East e-GovernmentPortal awardDubai Municipality (DM) has bagged the
Best Middle East e-Government Portal
award during the 10th Middle East Infor-
mation and Communication Technology
Excellence Awards presented at a ceremo-
ny held on the sidelines of the 11th GCC
e-Government Forum at Dubai World Trade
Centre on 25 May, 2005.
The award recognises an Internet por-
tal that furnishes combined e-Government
services provided by different government
organisations as a one-stop repository
where businesses and citizens can gain
access to all government services. The
e-Government initiative of Dubai Munici-
pality, started in 1999, has been a pioneer
in providing e-Services. All its services are
provided through one access point, which
is the DM portal http://www.dm.gov.ae/
Source: http://www.ameinfo.com
Vol. III No. 6 June 2005
Information for development
w w w . i 4 d . c s d m s . i n
Burkina Faso government’sinitiative to develop means ofcommunication in rural zonesBurkina Faso is classified among the poor-
est countries of the world but it is advanc-
ing in the world of technology.
The government of Burkina Faso issued
a law concerning the universal service and
a fund was set up. The idea consists in
feeding a fund, which will be used to devel-
op the rural zones in suitable means of
communication such as telephone, Inter-
net and others.
Source: http://www.iconnect-online.org
Perak to become ‘knowledgestate’ by 2020The state government of the Perak in Ma-
laysia has launched a strategy to transform
Perak into a ‘knowledge state’ by 2020.
The plan will be disseminated in two
stages and will focus on three areas: knowl-
edge infrastructure, knowledge economy
and knowledge society. A total of 25 initia-
tives will be put in place to support the
strategy, whose mission is to make ICT the
bedrock of the Perak economy. One of the
targets of the plan is to have a broadband
network installed in all government
agencies by 2006; other goals are to have
63 per cent Internet penetration through-
out the state by 2010 such as Internet
kiosks in all town centres and 40 per cent
e-mail usage in rural areas.
Source: http://www.enn.ie
Rwandan Information andCommunication Infrastructureconcentrates on ICT driveThe government of Rwanda has recognised
the role information and communication
technologies (ICTs) play in accelerating the
socio-economic development.
The Rwanda cabinet adopted the
National Information and Communication
Infrastructure (NICI) Policy and Plan in
2000. Moses Bayingana, Director, Private
Sector, Education and Community
Programmes has said that the policy is in
line with the government’s vision 2020.
The Rwanda Information Technology
Authority (RITA) is established as a state
agency to facilitate the implementation of
the national and sector ICT programmes
outlined in the NICI Policy and Plan.
The current thrust areas of NICI are
human capacity development, infrastruc-
ture, e-Government, ICT in education,
community access and private sector
facilitation.
Source: http://allafrica.com
Bihar approaches toe-Governance modeThe Indian state of Bihar would step into
e-Governance mode when the state
capital is directly connected through
video- conferencing with nine divisional
headquarters by the end of this month.
State Chief Secretary K.A.H. Subrama-
nian said that the facility, would be
formally launched on May 25 and extend-
ed to district headquarters of 37 districts of
the state from May 31. He also said that
video-conferencing would help the top brass
of the state administration keep in touch.
The facility would also permit regular
feedback from the district magistrates about
day-to-day developments related to
government schemes. The cost of setting
up the facility at the state capital and
divisional headquarters would be $15
million and for linking each district with
the state headquarters would cost $1.5
million. National Informatics Centre
Network (NICNET) will set up the
infrastructure for the facility.
Source: http://news.webindia123.com
24 i4d | June 2005
HRD Ministry’s new effort tobridge the digital divide in IndiaHuman Resource Development (HRD)
Ministry is hoping that the third attempt to
bridge the digital divide between private and
government schools succeeds where the
earlier two endeavours of Computer
Literacy and Studies in Schools (CLASS)
in the 1980’s and revised-CLASS of
1990’s failed.
HRD Ministry is optimistic about the
new approach named as Information and
Communication Technology@Schools
Scheme and hopeful that universalisation
of computer literacy would percolate to
students in small towns and the subordi-
nate divisions of a district in India. The
scheme has four main components-part-
nership with state governments and union
territories for providing computer-aided
education to secondary and higher second-
ary government schools; establishment of
two self-monitoring analysis and reporting
technology (SMART) schools in each state,
universalisation of computer literacy
through the network of Kendriya Vidyala-
yas and Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti to
incorporate computer literacy to 10 neigh-
bouring schools; and financial assistance
to State Institutes of Educational Tech-
nologies under the project mode.
Source: http://www.timesofindia.com
Education
Global Education Partnershipboosts up business skills inpoor Kenyan youthsThe non-profit Global Education Partner-
ship (GEP) - Wundanyi, which aims to
incorporate business skills to impoverished
Kenyan youths, won the $7,500 Africa
Hafkin Communications Prize, organised
by the Association for Progressive Commu-
nications.
The Hafkin prize recognises African
initiatives in the use of information and
communications technology for develop-
ment. GEP is based in the Taita Taveta
district of eastern Kenya. This area is one
of the poorest in the country, with a
poverty rate of 66%. The project aims to
improve the job prospects of Kenyans aged
between 15 and 24. The students are taught
commercial skills such as writing a
business plan, marketing and buying and
selling goods.
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk
Health
Madras Medical Missionlaunches telemedicineserviceIn India, the Madras Medical Mission
(MMM) has launched its telemedicine
service to connect 10 hospitals in the
state recently. The hospitals include those
in Anamalai, Tiruvallur, Dharapuram,
Tindivanam, Kumbakonam, Sriperumbu-
dur, Gopichettipalayam, Karaikudi and
Pattukottai. Under the initiative, special-
ists would be linked through a network
allowing them to receive and transmit
medical records such as echocardiograms,
CT scans and X-rays. Based on the
information, specialists would be able to
treat patients in remote areas.While inaugurating the space hub for
the electronic intensive care unit, Vergh-ese Eapen, Vice-President of Madras
The i4d News
BrBrazilian vazilian village steps intoillage steps intodigital agedigital age
Located in a narrow tropical valley, 180 miles southwest ofSouth America’s largest city of Sao Paulo, the village lacksphone lines and other basic services. But a move by thegovernment is driving Ivaporunduva into the digital age.
As a part of a larger plan to fight against poverty, thegovernment has installed a satellite-based Internet connectionthat will end years of isolation for the village. Residents couldmake doctor’s appointments online, find new markets to sellfruits and also download school lesson plans. It is been
expected that the Internet connection could perk up the community’s monthly income byhundreds of dollars each month. It is also permitting them to access bigger markets, wherethey could sell organic bananas at the main wholesale market.
Source: http://thehindubusinessline.com
Medical Mission, said telemedicine would
carry healthcare to the villages.
Source: http://www.hindu.com
Use of ICT to provide trainingon HIV, AIDSThe spread of HIV, AIDS and Tuberculosis
(TB) is the main warning to development
in Africa and in the rest of the world.
Furthermore, the scale of the epidemic
threatens to undo all other development
advancement. Therefore, logical action
would be taken to utilise ICT to deliver cru-
cial and life-saving information about HIV,
AIDS, TB, sexually transmitted infections,
nutrition and malaria to people.
The Managing Director of LearnScapes,
a South-African company said that consid-
ering the technology boom and the HIV
boom existing at the same time, they need
to extend the uses of ICT, which will assist
them in educating people about the dis-
eases. To fight against the epidemic, Learn-
Scapes developed a range of applicable
courses for delivery by ICT. These courses
include topics like HIV, AIDS, sexually trans-
mitted diseases, tuberculosis, diarrhoea,
nutrition, opportunistic infections,
malaria, cholera and general hygiene.
Source: http://www.itweb.co.za
Health and Safety Executiveintroduces e-Bulletin toupdate farmers on healthIn UK, the Health and Safety Executive
(HSE) has launched an agriculture e-mail
bulletin to update farmers about the latest
health and safety issues.
HSE’s agriculture e-Bulletin will be
issued free to subscribers roughly every
three months, providing brief information
on topical issues with links to more
detailed articles on the HSE website. It is
mainly aimed at farmers, farm managers,
landowners, trade associations and unions.
The first e-Bulletin was issued in April,
2005. Some of the topics covered included
new regulations on working at height;
tree-climbing research should prevent
accidents; dust masks or recent prosecu-
tions in the agriculture sector.
Source http://publictechnology.net
Irish government launcheshealth portalThe Irish government has officially
launched the ‘Harley Street of cyberspace,’
25June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in
The i4d News
KerKerKerala government to launchala government to launchala government to launche-Litere-Literary centres inary centres inKozhikode districtKozhikode district
In India, after the successful implementation of the ‘Akshaya’programme in the neighbouring district of Malappuram, theadministration of the state government of Kerala has recentlydecided to launch the e-Literary centres in the Kozhikode dis-trict of the state as well, aimed at addressing the socio-eco-nomic inequities in the society by bridging the digital divide.
The Collector Rachna Shah has said that as part of theKerala Government’s ambitious plan to introduce the pro-gramme in other districts, the administration would set up 176
computer learning centres in various parts of the district. The scheme would be a steppingstone for generating massive economic growth and creating direct employment opportunitiesin the district. In the first phase of the programme, entrepreneurs would be selected to set upself-sustaining Akshaya centres at approved locations for incorporating e-Literacy. Initially, thecentre would impart a 15-hour-training to a member of a household. In the second phase,each centre would offer a variety of services in e-Learning, e-Commerce, advanced IT train-ing, e-Governance and communication enabling the entrepreneurs to earn a steady income.The other districts, where the programme was being implemented were Kasargod, Thrissur,Ernakulam, Pathanamthitta and Kollam.
Source: http://www.hindu.com
an online communications network aimed
at health professionals and the citizens.
The website, http://www.healthhub.ie is
developed by Odyssey Internet Portals in
collaboration with the Irish College of
General Practitioners. It is developed in an
attempt to facilitate the interaction and
communication of health professional
organisations with their members and with
each other, as well as providing the general
public with a point of access to health
professionals around the country.
Source: http://www.enn.ie
Agriculture
ITC wins Golden Peacockglobal award for it’se-Choupal initiativeIndian Tobacco Company (ITC) has wonthe Golden Peacock global award forcorporate social responsibility (CSR) inemerging economies 2005 for its e-Choupal
and social and farm forestry initiatives.
Dr Ola Ullsten, former Prime Minister
of Sweden, who also headed the jury,
presented the award in London on May 12.
According to ITC, the award recognised the
impact of the two initiatives in transform-
ing lives and landscapes in rural India.
Presently, ITC’s e-Choupal initiative
provides over 3.5 million farmers’ access to
crop-specific, customised and comprehen-
sive information at their village and
vernacular. Over the next decade, the
e-Choupal network aims to cover over 100,
000Indian villages, representing a sixth of
Indian villages and connecting more than
10 million farmers.
Source: www.business-standard.com
AP government tocomputerise all agriculturaloffices within two yearsIn India, the Andhra Pradesh government
has decided to computerise all mandal ag-
ricultural offices within next two years with
a view to provide farmers access to latest
information in agriculture-related issues.
Poonam Malakondaiah, Commissioner
for Agriculture, while addressing a nation-
al workshop that held recently in the state
on ‘Web services on oilseeds development:
DACNET (Department of Agriculture and
Cooperation Network) Phase II initiative’,
has said that half of the 213 offices has
been computerised so far and they will
complete the remaining ones by 2006-07.
She further said that the government is
looking at ICT as a potential tool to reduce
cost of cultivation and increase economic
returns to farmers. In order to impart the
fruits of ICT to farmers the government is
providing computer training to farmers in
villages. The Directorate of Oilseeds Devel-
opment and the National Informatics
Centre (NIC) conducted the workshop.
Source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com
CRIDA, IIIT to provideIT-based agriculturalinformation in IndiaThe Central Institute for Dryland Agricul-
ture (CRIDA) along with the Indian Insti-
tute of Information Technology (IIIT),
Hyderabad, proposes to initiate a pilot pro-
gramme for IT-based agricultural informa-
tion and dissemination system to provide
weather-based decisions in agriculture.
The proposed project is expected to
provide real-time data collection and
advisories, weather-based forewarning of
crop pests and diseases. YS Ramakrishna,
Director of CRIDA said that the agricultur-
al operations require adequate contingen-
cy planning. Hence, they are planning a
coordinated project with the International
Crops Research Institute for Semi-Arid
Tropics (ICRISAT), Acharya NG Ranga
Agricultural Institute (ANGRAU), IIIT,
National Council for Medium Range
Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF) and
India Meteorological Department (IMD).
Using the expertise of each of the centres,
the agro meteorological programme aims
to know the influence of weather on
dynamics of pests and diseases, climatic
changes and its impact on different
agro-ecological regions and identification
of the crops based on Geographic Informa-
tion System (GIS) applications. The infor-
mation includes some general information
like weather, crop demand-supply informa-
tion, market prices, credit-related informa-
tion; pre-sowing information like best
practices in soil and tillage, choice of crops,
source of seed materials, time to sowing;
and crop production and protection meas-
ures from pests, adverse weather
conditions and post-harvest practices like
time to harvest, storage facilities, current
pricing and offtake at local markets.
Source: http://financialexpress.com
Community Radio
Community radio: A strongdevelopment tool in ruralUttaranchalAlthough a full-fledged community radio
movement is still to become a reality in
26 i4d | June 2005
ICT community centreICT community centrelaunched in rurlaunched in rural Ghanaal Ghana
Ghana’s first rural-based Information and Communication Tech-nology (ICT) business centre, commenced operations at Nkurankan,a market town near Koforidua in the Yilo Krobo district recently.
Sogakope in the Volta Region and Sege in the Greater-AccraRegion are also expected to benefit from a similar facility, in thecourse of the year. Ghana Telecom (GT), the United NationsEnvironment Programme (UNEP) and two other partners, under
a joint pilot project initiated the scheme. They have dubbed ‘e-Care’ to stimulate business andeconomic development in rural communities. The public could access telephone,fax,computer, Internet and other communication services that would be made possible by renew-able energy at the rural business centres. Deputy Chief Executive Officer of GT, DicksonOduro-Nyanning, while speaking at the launch of the facility at Nkurankan said that it is theaim of the company to help rural communities to become part of ‘the knowledge society’ byfurnishing them with ICT facilities. He urged entrepreneurs to patronise the centres to enablethem to develop rural-based economy. He also said that the company is committed to createawareness on ICT benefits in rural communities, as well as enhancing entrepreneurial skills ofthe rural people.
Source: http://www.ghanaweb.com
The i4d News
India, villagers in various rural pockets all
over the country are using the airwaves to
put up their voice about various issues.
Uttaranchal Community Radio is
currently performing as an important
development tool for creating awareness,
spreading information and facilitating
communication, despite the absence of
policy support and government aid. It is a
radio service for geographically bound
communities in areas with poor infrastruc-
ture where people do not have access to
the mainstream national and regional
media. The service, which is run and
managed by local people addressing issues
relating to the community in the local
language, was introduced in Uttaranchal
by the Himalaya Trust, a Dehra Dun-based
civil society organisation, with support from
UNESCO, in September 2001. Since,
May 2004, five community radio groups -
four in Garhwal in the Western part of
the state, and one in Kumaon in the
East - have been engaged in a research
initiative looking at grassroots media
and poverty.
Source: http://www.infochangeindia.org
Telecom
Reliance Infocomm aims tobridge digital divideReliance Infocomm (RIM) has decided to
expand its network to cover a targeted
4.3-crore population in Tamil Nadu, India.
Participating in the ‘Reliance Carnvial’
held in Chennai, capital of Tamil Nadu, to
commemorate the World Telecom Day on
17 May, 2005, RIM Business Head of Tamil
Nadu, Ajay Awasthi said that they are work-
ing to bridge the digital divide between the
rural and urban areas. Their main focus is
to create an equitable information society
in Tamil Nadu and all over India. Reliance
would connect 600 towns, 10,000 villages,
14 National Highways, 22 State Highways,
37 rail routes and 43-million population in
the state by the end of this year. About
5,700 towns and 4,00,000 villages would be
connected across the country under this
phase. The major focus, however, would
be on providing total connectivity through-
out Tamil Nadu.
Source: http://www.newindpress.com/
Digital library
UGC sets up InformationLibrary Network to facilitateaccess to e-Publications inIndiaVIirtual libraries are not a distant dream
any longer if the plan to automate them
and digitise data is anything to go by. The
University Grants Commission (UGC) has
embarked on an ambitious programme just
to achieve this, while networking various
universities to provide access to informa-
tion and books across the country. TheChairman of the State Council of Higher
Education, K.C. Reddy has inaugurateda training programme designed forlibrarians towards this drive. As a part ofthis initiative, a five-day intensive trainingprogramme to enhance access to e-Publi-cations has been initiated by a team ofscientists from Information LibraryNetwork (INFLIBNET) for librarians from50 government colleges. The Indian stateof Andhra Pradesh has become the firststate to achieve this. The INFLIBNETcentre based in Ahmedabad, India, hasdeveloped a software package that helpsin computerising the functioning oflibraries before they are networked with
each other.
Source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com
Local language
Microsoft launches low-costPCs with Hindi versionWindows XP in IndiaIn a bid to target the first time users and
make personal computer (PC) more
affordable, Microsoft recently announced
the launch of its PCs with Hindi version
of Windows XP, priced at $.42 million,
in India.
Microsoft is counting upon a previous
tie-up with the Uttaranchal government
for an e-Governance project for the new
venture’s success. It has tied-up with the
State Bank of India, United Bank of India
and Bank of India for easy financing
schemes that include a down payment of
$.084 million and equal monthly
installment of $8.86 over 48 months.
The Microsoft India Business and
Marketing Director, Ranjivit Singh said that
the PC is launched for the first-time for
home computer buyers in Uttaranchal as
part of an exercise that will cover all
Hindi-speaking Indian states. The starter
edition offers Wordpad, Internet Explorer,
Outlook and Media Player with a Hindi user
interface. In Uttaranchal, the PC is being
provided under the state government’s
‘People’s PC Programme’, under which
government employees can buy them in
installments.
Source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com
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June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 27
• African industries,• African workforce,• The governments,• Education.
There is an urgent need for Africangovernments to put in place ICT policiesthat will ensure and enhance the delivery ofinformation into individuals, institutionsand African society at large that ICT is apositive facilitator rather than a socialhindrance or threat.
African government should ensure thatthe national, sub-regional and regional ICTpolicies put in place are geared towardsenhancing the ease of access to information
and empowering the people in various wayswith the tools of ICT at their disposal. Thereshould be encouragement for individuals toown computers, cyber-cafes and other ICTprojects at all levels of the private sector.
To appreciate the impact of ICT usageon the environment, African governmentsshould put policies in place that will helpdevelop and promote environmentalinformation that is Internet-based.
Illiteracy is not only a disease, but also ahindrance to development. Due to the factthat illiteracy rates in most African countriesare very high, there is an urgent need forAfrican governments to develop policies inthis digital age that will help to establishlearning activities among educational
It is a well known fact that Information andCommunication Technology (ICT) can serveas a powerful agent of change. This has beena realistic vision entertained by thedeveloped countries including America andEurope especially, Norway. Norway inparticular believes that these changes thatcan be brought by ICT can have a widerange of social implications, which will havepositive impacts in the way of life of itspeople. Norway has a very high standard ofliving, however their economy is highlydependant upon petroleum and othernatural resources. Norway has recognisedthis dependency and is attempting todiversify their economy to include informa-tion technology and other industries in theevent so that the demand for naturalresources changes.
On the contrary, a lot of African coun-tries’ economies rely mainly on agricultureand a few mineral resources. It is time forAfrican governments to embrace the newtrend and agent of change - ICT and devel-op policies that will enhance the use of ICTas a tool for socio-economic development.This important vision that is lacking in mostAfrican countries, could be the turning pointfrom poverty and misery on the continentto better the levels of life and happiness.
The African governments shouldunderstand the need to institute national,sub-regional and regional ICT policies(e-Africa) that will allow them to participatein the ‘knowledge economy’. Informationis power and as we all know can do a lot. Itis never too late just as Norway is doing totry and establish a comprehensive plan andcommitted substantial resources in joiningthe race of ICT for development. To followNorway’s example that is proving to besuccessful, African governments can alsochannel their efforts into sectors such as:• Individual, culture and environment,
ICT POLICY IN AFRICA
Challenge for Africangovernments
institutions in the continent taking intoaccount the culture and language aspects.These educational policies should alsoaddress the development or promotion ofskills in ICT among educators as well as thedevelopment of public-private partnershipsin the uses of ICT.
One of the reasons for technophobia orthe fear of changing to the electronic ageespecially among the older age groups is thefear of security of data on the networks.While African governments need to putpolicies in place that will help establish anICT friendly legal environment in thecontinent to promote competition, theyneed to consider the development of aregional strategy that will ensure dataintegrity, reliability and security. Withsecurity and fair competitions in place,governments can then develop policies thatwill encourage and promote the export ofICT products and services among indus-tries, within the African region and outsideof the continent.
In conclusion, the race for the knowl-edge economy may be a little too late forAfrican governments but that is no excusefor them to be completely left behind.The pursuit for the attempt to establishthemselves as part of the global ICT leader-ship may have eluded African nations.But this should not stop their governmentsfrom establishing comprehensive plans andcommitting substantial amounts ofresources, towards efforts in meeting thePoverty Eradication and Alleviation Program(PEAP) and Millennium DevelopmentGoals (MDG) through the use of ICT byimplementing national, sub-regional andregional ICT policies.
Lawrence Kweku Yamuah
Armauer Hansen Research Institute
Ethiopia
i4d | June 200528
ICT POLICY OF ETHIOPIA
Changing positivelyEthiopia has no coherent policy in place tosupport the growth of IT industry. Exist-ing high import tariffs (40%) on computerand communications equipment make thewidespread use of such systems ratherexpensive, particularly for smaller business-es and institutions.
Ethiopian Telecommunications Corpo-ration (ETC) is the incumbent publictelecom operator, with a monopoly over alltelecom services in the country (fixed, mo-bile, Internet and data communications).Independent Very Small Aperture TerminalSatellite (VSAT) connections and satellitephones are not allowed, and call-backservices are illegal.
The national telecommunication switch-ing capacity of Ethiopia is about 550000lines, of which about 340000 are currentlyin use. About 60 percent of telephones areconcentrated in Addis Ababa, the capitalcity. Ethiopia’s teledensity is about 0.54, oneof the lowest in sub-Saharan Africa. Use ofmobile phones in Ethiopia is limited to90000, but it is growing. Costs are relative-ly affordable, but service quality and availa-bility are low. ETC plans to introducepre-paid and subscriber mobile lines (about400,000 new lines during 2004-2005) toalleviate the situation.
The number of Internet accounts inEthiopia is still limited to only 6000.Despite the availability of the nationwidelocal call tariff for dial-up Internet users, thedistribution of Internet users is still stronglyskewed to the capital (94% are located inAddis Ababa). This is partly due to thelimited availability of telecom infrastructure,and partly because of the low level ofcomputerisation outside the capital.
For Ethiopia to meet its developmentobjectives using ICTs as enablers, consider-able investments are needed in institutionaland sector capacity building efforts. Thesame is true about human resource develop-ment needs, and communications and in-formation technology infrastructure.Appropriate policy and regulatory reformsare needed to ensure equitable, reliable, and
affordable access to information andcommunication technologies. In response tothese challenges, the government hasembarked on a major effort to put in placemany of the building blocks required fordeveloping a robust ICT sector in Ethiopia.
Signs of changeICT development in Ethiopia has beentreated in an ad hoc manner. But there aresigns that this is changing. The ‘ICT PolicyPaper of 2003’ provides a framework fordefining the direction of the sector and itsdevelopment objectives. It also sets the stagefor institutional arrangements for policydevelopment, and the promotion and regu-lation of the ICT sector. The Ethiopian Tel-ecommunications Agency (ETA) is the newregulator. However, it does not have anyspectrum management and monitoringactivities due to lack of licensing schemes,human resources, and monitoring equip-ment. The government has recently estab-lished the Ethiopian ICT DevelopmentAuthority (EICTDA) to propose policy andto coordinate a multi-sectoral effort fordevelopment of the ICT sector. Two keytelecommunications agencies (ETA andETC) now have newly appointed manag-ing directors and the new managementteams are keen on advancing the ICT sectordevelopment objectives. All these develop-ments could facilitate the steady growth anddevelopment of the sector.
Education and trainingConsiderable efforts are under way toincrease the number of trained ICT profes-sionals in Ethiopia. These include vocation-al training programmess offered by variousinstitutions, as well as college and universitylevel degree programmess in computerscience, electronics, telecommunications andinformation theory, software engineeringand programming, technical management,and design and maintenance of manage-ment information systems.
ETC’s Institute for Telecommunicationsand Information Technology (ITIT)
Gordon Feller
Urban Age Institute, USA
Ethiopia has nocoherent policy inplace to support thegrowth of ITindustry. TheGovernment ofEthiopia hasembarked on amajor effort to putin place many of thebuilding blocksrequired fordeveloping a robustICT sector inEthiopia.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 29
provides basic training in plant maintenance, telegraph and telex,switching, transmission, traffic and management of telecommuni-cation networks. ITIT has recently begun basic training on compu-ter applications and is planning to offer graduate courses in telecomengineering, management and information technologies in2004 - 2005. Since 1992, the private sector has been providingbasic computer and software applications training. The growth ofcomputer training centers in the country, despite their unevenquality, has improved the general level of computer literacy andresulted in more skilled computer usage.
The basic education system has been virtually untouched bycomputers or Internet. Very few of the 12000 primary schools havecomputers or Internet access. The government is currently imple-menting a School Network program (SchoolNet) that will connectabout 500 secondary schools as part of a national network. Thegovernment has started to introduce ICT training programs insecondary and Technical and Vocational and Educational Training(TVET) schools.
The tertiary education system comprises of 6 national universi-ties and 3 polytechnics with a total of approximately 75000students. Addis Ababa University (AAU) is the largest tertiary insti-tution and is also host to the African Virtual University (AVU)facilities. AAU has developed a campus-wide network with partialaccess to Internet. Most other institutions have limited access tocomputer networks and Internet.
HealthEthiopia has one of the lowest health status indicators in the world.Infant mortality is 98/1000, maternal mortality rate is 1,800/100,000, and life expectancy is 42 years (2002 World Develop-ment Indicators). Health services are only accessible to about 50percent of the population, and most of the medical experts areconcentrated in the major cities. To increase the use of ICT in healthservice administration, the government is developing a computerbased Health Information System.
e-Commercee-Commerce and the use of the Internet in trade are at a very earlystage of development in Ethiopia. e-Commerce related laws andregulations such as privacy protection and digital signature are yetto be adopted. Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs) are being intro-duced on a pilot basis.
e-GovernanceThere are about 350000 civil servants in Ethiopia, of which only2200 have e-mail accounts (based on 735 government EthioNetaccounts each having 3 users). It is estimated that only about14 percent of public servants have access to PCs. Several govern-ment ministries and agencies, including Ministry of Finance, haveonly parts of their operations computerised.
There are also plans for computerisation of other public sectormanagement operations. Through the European Union Delega-tion, the International Parliamentary Union (IPU) has providedfunding to the Ethiopian Federal Parliament and the FederationCouncil for a project called Development and Upgrading of theParliamentary Information System (DUPIS). The Ethiopian Civil
Service College in Addis Ababa is operating a Global DevelopmentLearning Network (GDLN) centre, offering video conferencingand distance learning services in Addis Ababa. The two-way videoconferencing facility is housed in a classroom capable of taking upto 40 students. A variety of courses have been offered to about1,200 students.
The government is developing implemention plans for agovernment network and a local authority (Woreda) network, toconnect the Federal, regional and local governments. The initialphase will create a regional and Woreda administration networkthat will connect over 560 high schools and 611 Woreda adminis-trations with the regional and Federal governments. The govern-ment is also considering broader use of these facilities for servicedelivery to local communities and offering them as access points forrural connectivity and access through a variety of arrangements,which include public as well as private service providers.
Private sectorThe private sector has been increasingly active in offering IT relatedgoods and services in recent years. Over 170 companies offer com-puter technology related products and services, mostly in AddisAbaba. Encouraging developments in licensing of private sectoroperators to set up cyber cafes and to engage in sales, installationand service of communication equipments are also consistent withthe government’s stated objectives in its ICT Policy paper.
BroadcastingThe Broadcasting law allows setting up of NGO programmes, butnon-governmental operations or programmes are virtually nonex-istent in Ethiopia. Staff of the Ethiopian Broadcasting Authority(EBA) lack exposure to international best practices and thedevelopment of local (language) content. ETC’s position as theincumbent monopoly has led to its inefficiency and ineffectivenessin responding to customer needs. The national government hasrecently decided to proceed with the licensing of rural connectivityinitiatives, private sector Internet Service Providers (ISPs) andcommunity radios.
ChallengesMajor challenges remain in the areas of rural connectivity,development of national telecom infrastructure, mobile telephony,data communications, and availability and affordability of Internetand related services. The Information Technology sector (comput-ers, networks, and related services) is small but growing. ICThuman resources are limited due to small markets, low salaries, lowon the job incentives, and lack of institutional infrastructure.Sector-specific ICT applications are limited in scope, and very oftenare implemented in a disjointed and fragmented manner. Theimplemented solutions are also generally under-utilised. Informa-tion availability, particularly in local languages, is limited.
The utter lack of ICT standards hinders widespread growthof applications, particularly in local languages. In practical terms,a number of regulatory, technical, and operational pre-requisitesmust be instituted before ICTs can have a significantimpact on Ethiopia’s poverty reduction and socio-economicdevelopment efforts.
i4d | June 200530
Although, it is not directly related to ICT issues but it willdefinitely help the society in accessing all forms of information. Wecan have WiFi, WiMax and all sorts of connectivity technologiesbut these need to compliment by easily accessible and affordablecommunication tools for demystifying the technology and for grass-root applications of the same.
UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have largelyemphasised upon strategic use of ICT for addressing developmen-tal issues. How well are we prepared at the policy level and/orotherwise in implementing ICTs in our national mission?I think we still have a long way to go on this front. There have beenefforts to link ICT to developmental programmes both at the levelof government as well as civil society organisations. However, theseislands of success do exist and there is a need to link them cohesivelyand devise modalities for up-scaling the same. There are threeessential requirements for taking this concept forward. One is tohave willingness for ‘transparency’ in information dissemination,which will carry any initiative for empowering communities withinformation. The second aspect is to have ‘economically viable’models for information dissemination that can facilitate in reachingthe technology/technical knowhow to the rural communities sonecessary for meeting MDGs. The third facet is to focus ICTs towork for governance issues, wherein, we are able to cut on govern-ment red-tapism, reduce process cost and efficiently execute devel-opment programmes.
Looking at some of the foreign countries we will find that Malaysiais having a multimedia policy, Singapore is taking lead ine-Governance, Korea and Japan are strong ICT players andJordan is already having an ICT Ministry. Where do you see Indiaamong South Asian countries with respect to government’s role inproliferating ICT usage? Should there be a separate e-Governancepolicy as well?Talking about the need of e-Governance policy, I think it will even-tually be required. However, at present, the policy and planningshould be more focused on application side in bridging the divide.Policy instruments should emphasise on finding innovative andcost-effective ways of applying technology that works for masses.
Portrait is a new feature series to provide aplatform for showcasing the various activities ofdevelopment agencies and the potential role of ICTsin strengthening their initiatives.
The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI)Established in 1974, The Energy and Resourc-es Institute – TERI (www.teriin.org) hasreinforced its position as a dynamic and flexibleorganisation with a global vision and a localfocus towards holistic societal development.
While in the initial period, the focus was mainly on documentationand information dissemination activities, research activities in thefields of energy, environment, and sustainable development wereinitiated towards the end of 1982.
“Policy should address needsof community”
Ibrahim Hafeezur RehmanAssociate Director
Action ProgrammesThe Energy and Resources Institute(TERI)
New Delhi
What are your comments regarding the absence of ‘Communi-cation’ component in Indian IT policy. Why are we overlookinginexpensive communication technologies like ‘CommunityRadio’ for development, while investing in cost intensive satellitebased communication?I am not too sure whether it is right to link the work done in thefield of satellite linkage to that of community radio issue. Satellitetechnology is related to information in much broader sense thancommunity radio and the functions and benefits of satellitetechnology are not comparable to community radio. Moreover,the demands for community radio facilities have not really comeforward in a structured way and even benefits of using thesetechnologies are not communicated well to the government. Thecurrent debate on radio in our country is largely spiraling aroundfrequency modulation (FM) licensing that does not have muchdevelopmental edge to offer for rural people. Civil society organ-isations need to assertively voice their demand to the governmentand strongly advocate on this issue.
With convergence technologies and innovative connectivityoptions like Wifi and Wimax, the definition of IT is expanding.Are we in need of an ICT policy?I do not want to strictly distinguish between IT and ICT policy.Practically, there is a very thin dividing line between the two.Our primary need should be to have a policy that addresses bothinformation and communication needs of the community. Therecently invoked Bill on Right to Information is a step towards it.
PORTRAIT
The genesis of these activities lay in TERI’s firm belief thatefficient utilisation of energy, sustainable use of natural resources,large-scale adoption of renewable energy technologies, andreduction of all forms of waste would move the process of develop-ment towards the goal of sustainability. So the work of TERI rangesfrom providing environment-friendly solutions to rural energyproblems to helping shape the development of the Indian oil andgas sector; from tackling global climate change issues across manycontinents to enhancing forest conservation efforts among localcommunities; from advancing solutions to growing urbantransport and air pollution problems to promoting energyefficiency in the Indian industry.
As a unique developing country institution, TERI is deeplycommitted to every aspect of sustainable development throughresearch, advocacy and ground interventions. While TERI’svision is global, its roots are firmly entrenched in Indian soil.
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 31
At the moment, the policy environment should be macro in natureand once policies get into place we would need strong regulationsfor proper vigilance against misuse of information access. Countriesthat already have a head start in these fields can be good case studiesfor us to learn lessons from their successes and pitfalls. There cannotbe a one-time one-stop policy frame to address all issues.
How well do you think our IT policy is equipped to address theissue of unequal technology access born out of socio-economicinequity, high cost, language barrier etc.?Policy cannot be blamed nor can be considered as the sole solutionfor every problem. Policy never restricts us from developing soft-ware that runs on local languages. In fact, the policy does advocatefor such an approach. Stumbling blocks are that, who should do it?what are the costs involved? and what is the economics behind it?For instance, a software company that is working in the field ofinformation dissemination will eventually develop applications inlocal language. This is because it is the only way in which it canaddress the huge local market that is there. As a matter of fact, todaywe have a large number of applications being made available inlocal languages. With that regard, policy is in no way a handicap formaking IT applications to overcome local challenges.
Education and knowledge-based learning can undergo revolu-tionary change through modern ICTs. How is India’s IT policyhelping us to achieve that?I think the educational institutes should realise the potential of ITand be more conscious and willing to use ICTs in education. Policycan only promote technology tools but the onus of application sidelies with the agencies like Ministry of Human Resource Develop-ment, Department of Education at the state and central level as alsowith civil society organisations. Initiatives have to be recognisedand technology tools have to be integrated with them to makeeducation more impacting.
What are the efforts initiated by TERI towards using ICT appli-cations for development?In TERI, we are creating lot of compact disks (CDs) that has educa-tional content, which can be used as learning resource. We are alsodoing research work into what is essentially required at the
demand side of IT-led effort for information dissemination. Wehave even initiated efforts in trying to decipher what forms ofcontent can be generated so that they remain relevant to commu-nities. In one such example we have set up kiosks in Rajasthan incollaboration with ‘One World South Asia’, where we are tryingto capture small success stories from the grassroot level that aretailored for specific groups. We encourage communities to narrateand document their knowledge by themselves so that they can beproduced as information for others.
What are your recommendations with regard to orienting theexisting IT policy of India towards basic development?First of all, the policy should work towards bringing more trans-parency in sharing data across public, private and governmentdomains. This would enhance our level of appreciation for issuesthat concern us and will go on to empower people in a true sense.Secondly, we should create much better infrastructure in ruralsector to provide connectivity and access to technology. This iscrucial to forge ahead the overall developmental process of thecountry. Thirdly, we need to have an evolutionary approach toregulatory policy in ICT. This will ensure that mass access andopen connectivity does not get exploited with unscrupulous in-tentions. Fourthly, the policy should address the huge diversityof our language and culture and facilitate easy dissemination ofinformation across all regions.
Even though Indian IT industry is growing rapidly yet it ranks86th in UN Report (2004) on global e-Governance readiness.What are your comments on it?Up till now, the field of IT where we have excelled lies in thedomain of corporate software development and services. A lot stillneed to be done for using IT in rural development. Obviously,the current situation does not give a very happy scenario for acountry that on one hand is aiming to be an IT superpower andon the other, miserably lacking on applying the same technologyfor improving the lot of the poor. Governance structures have tobe redesigned in order to fit in modern technology in govern-ment processes. However, we must make it a point to move at ahigher pace in terms of e-Governance implementation.
The emphasis of the institution is always on finding innovativesolutions to make the world a better place to live in.
The activities in TERI range from formulating local andnational level strategies to suggesting global solutions. It is with thispurpose that TERI has established Indian centres in Bangalore,Mumbai, Goa, Guwahati and Mukteshwar. It has also establishedits presence in Japan and Malaysia. It has set up affiliate institutes:TERI–NA in Washington DC, USA, and TERI–Europe inLondon, UK. The Governing Council of TERI comprises eminentand distinguished individuals from a variety of fields.
TERI hosts the annual Delhi Sustainable DevelopmentSummit, which is swiftly gathering momentum as a major forumfor the convergence of globally renowned leaders and thinkers deal-ing with the issue of sustainability. With a staff strength of over600, drawn from multidisciplinary and highly specialised fields,offices and regional centres equipped with state-of-the-art facilities,
and a diverse range of activities, TERI is the largest developingcountry institution working to move human society towards asustainable future. TERI makes effective use of the latest develop-ments in modern information technology in both its in-house andoutreach activities. TERI lays great emphasis on training, capacitybuilding, and education. In 1999, it set up the TERI School ofAdvanced Studies, which has been recognised as a deemed univer-sity by the University Grants Commission, India. The TERI Schoolis evolving as a research university, offering doctoral and master’sprogrammes in bio-resources, bio-technology, energy, environment,and regulatory and policy studies.
Having celebrated its silver jubilee in February 2000, TERI isnow poised for future growth, driven by a global vision andoutreach, with a philosophy that assigns primacy to enterprise ingovernment, industry, and individual actions.
Dipanjan Banerjee, [email protected]
i4d | June 200532
Cyberlaw has become a buzzword nowadays. In simple terms,cyberlaw is the law applicable on the activities of the cyberspace. Ittypically encompasses all the cases, statutes and constitutionalprovisions that impact persons and institutions who control theentry to cyber space, create the hardware and software whichenable people to access cyber space or use their own computers togo online and enter cyber space.
In India the cyberlaws are contained in the InformationTechnology Act, 2000 which was notified on 17 October 2000.It is based on the United Nation’s Commission for InternationalTrade related laws (UNCITRAL) model law.
The need for a new legislation became imminent because theexisting laws did not recognise the validity of transactions carriedthrough Internet. This absence of the legal framework became abarrier to the growth of e-commerce in India. There was an urgentneed for an enabling and supportive legal infrastructure in thecountry that would facilitate e-commerce. The new law aims toprovide the legal infrastructure for e-commerce in India bygoverning the transactions through the Internet and otherelectronic medium.
Internet and specially e-mail revolutionised the communication,so much so that the postal and courier industry faced a threat fromthis new medium. However, there was no law in the country whichgave legal validity and sanction to this new mode of communica-tion. As a consequence e-mail remained ‘illegal’. The Courts werereluctant to grant judicial recognition to the legality of e-mail in theabsence of any specific law on the same.
Further with the increase in Internet proliferation, the crime incyberspace also increased manifolds. There was a need to check thisgrowing menace of cybercrime.
As a solution to the missing link in the legal infrastructure of thecountry and to check the increasing cybercrime, the Governmentof India enacted Information Technology Act.
However, in the last few years the circumstances and thetechnologies have changed tremendously and to keep pace withthese changes it is now high time that we make changes in the Actin consultation with the Internet users, industry and otherstakeholders. It is suggested that the following issues be consideredby the stakeholders for the amendment of the IT Act:
Make the IT Act technology neutral The IT Act in its current form is at some places biased towards onetechnology. As for example, the Act recognises digital signaturesonly as equivalent to the signatures in writing. It is biased towards aparticular technology, the PKI (Public Key Infrastructure) which isbased on the assymetric encryption system, thus limiting the scopeof innovation in technology. There are also other available technol-ogies and may be in future, we will see much better technologies
which may offer the same functionalities. The solution to thisproblem could be to introduce the concept of electronic signaturesand remove all reference to the digital signature and its operations.The specifics of the technology and its usage can be provided laterunder the Rules framed under the Act.
Separate judicial and investigating agenciesfor cybercrimesDuring the last few years, ithas been observed that it isdifficult to train the existingjudiciary and investigatingagencies on the new technol-ogies. The state of affairswould be much better ifthere is a separate specialisedcourt to try the cybercrimesand separate investigating agency for investigation. It is pertinentto mention here that the IT Act does provide for a cyber appellatetribunal, however, it is not functional till date. Moreover, the cyberappellate tribunal shall try the contraventions (civil offences) andnot the cybercrimes. It is recommended that the jurisdiction of thecyber appellate tribunal be also increased to try the cybercrimes.
Privacy of individuals and protection ofpersonal dataToday the personal contact details of individuals are being sold byone organisation to another without the consent of the concernedindividual. Industry associations are advocating for providing pro-tection to the foreign personal data, which is imported or accessedby the Indian companies under the outsourcing contracts. Howev-er, no one is raising voice for the privacy of the Indian citizen.
Issue of the rising devil of spamEvery Internet user today is suffering from the menace ofspam – unsolicited commercial e-mails which not only takes awayhis Internet hours but also his precious time. The IT Act shouldinclude some provision to tackle the ever-growing menace of spam.
There are many other issues like Internet security, liberalisingencryption standards, adopting a better safe harbour policy(thereby minimising the liability of the carrier/ intermediary) whichcan be raised and answered only after a national debate of thestakeholders of Internet. It is high time now to have a publicconsultation on the amendments and implementation of theInformation Technology.
Rishi Chawla
Center for Communications Law & Policy Research, India
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ACT
Need for amending
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 33
What led to the foundation of CRY?With a burning passion to serve deprived children of the societyMr. Rippan Kapur started CRY with some of his like-minded friendsand raised a small corpus of Rs. 50/-. Although Rippan passedaway in the year 1994, his dreams are kept alive through variousactivities of CRY.
What is the extent of influence for CRY in terms of its social andgeographical reach?CRY started its operation from Mumbai, followed by branchoffices in Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai and Kolkata. Currently, ourwork area spans over as many as 17 Indian states. Till now, CRY haspartnered in over 300 child development projects, impactingapproximately 1.37 million children across 2500 communities. Atpresent, CRY has nearly 0.1 million individuals and organisationalpartners supporting to carry out our programmes.
What primary ‘mechanisms’ does CRY employ in its effort toaddress child issues?In ensuring child rights, CRY partners with various NGOs,individuals, corporates and the government. We have been theprime mover in forming state-level networks of organisationsworking for children’s rights in Maharashtra, Orissa, West Bengal,Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi and Tamil Nadu. We are also partof many state and national issue-based alliances like the NationalAlliance for the Fundamental Right to Education (NAFRE),Campaign Against Child Labour (CACL), End Child Prostitutionin Asian Tourism (ECPAT) and Donor Agency Network (DAN).
What are the major achievements of CRY in advocating for childcentric interventions in government policies?One of the landmark successes in our advocacy efforts is in partner-ing with NAFRE. For this, we mobilised all the state alliances andduring the Parliament session that discussed the ‘Education Bill’,we led a rally of about 50,000 people from different states of Indiain demand for right to education for all children. During 2004general elections which coincided with CRY’s 25th year commemo-ration, we initiated a campaign to evaluate political parties based ontheir commitment to ensure the rights of children in the country.We also lobbied for inclusion of child rights in their pre-electionmanifestos by sharing a ‘CRY Charter of Demands for Children’.
Apart from these, we are consultants to the Ministry of SocialJustice and Empowerment regarding juvenile homes in 6 states ofIndia. In future, we will be collaborating with the government onMember of Parliament sensitisation programmes and building ofan MP’s forum on child rights. We also plan to work with variouslevels of government to promote a comprehensive child rightsAct/Law and the formation of a strong Child Rights Commission.
What is the level of preparedness of our country for achievingMDG 4 (reduce child mortality) and how does CRY addressMDGs through its overall agenda?Efforts of various child rights organisations like CRY are continuingand we are relentlessly working towards these goals. Some moreinitiatives are expected from Central and State Governments.
How CRY is utilising ICT in their programmes?CRY’s working area being spread out into very interior places, wecannot use ICT at all locations. Our IT applications are primarilyrestricted only to urban and semi-urban projects. However, we areextensively using our website to disseminate information regardingchild rights.
How CRY is working towards mobilising general public supportfor child relief?CRY’s general experience shows that people are very muchconcerned about children’s issues and look on CRY to channelisetheir passion into positive action. As part of CRY’s 25th year com-memoration, we initiated a freedom movement for India’s childrenwhere we urged people to sign ‘CRY Free a Child Chakris’ as astatement of their support for child rights. This campaign enlistedsupport from almost half a million people, making the Chakri asymbol of freedom for India’s children.
What is the future plan of CRY towards strengthening itscampaigns and programmes?CRY’s long-term endeavour is to include a ‘rights’ mode besides the‘immediate relief ’ mode. For this, CRY is planning to get increas-ingly involved with advocacy issues and developing alliances andnetworking with more number of civil society organisations. More-over, our youth and volunteer groups are working towards devel-oping ‘Citizen Action Groups’ in different localities in order toaddress and work specifically for child rights in their local areas.
ZOOMING IN
Protecting child rights
Ms. Bondana DuttaDirector - North & East, CRY
CRY – Child Relief and You (www.cry.org) is a premier Indian child
rights organisation working for basic rights of survival, protection and
healthy development of all children in the society, in a word, ‘to
childhood’. Started in 1979, CRY has immensely partnered in large
number of child development projects. Over the past 26 years, CRY has learned that
ensuring child rights in a sustainable manner is possible only when grassroots action is
combined with community empowerment, active citizenship and advocacy.
i4d | June 200534
Books receivedInformation Technology for Development
IT Policy and Strategy Papers for Nepal
Edited by: Greta M. Rana (Senior Editor), Kesang T. Lama,Manohar k. Bhattarai
Publisher: International Centre for Integrated MountainDevelopment for the National Planning Commission Secretariat ofHis Majesty’s Government of Nepal Singha Durbar, Kathmandu,pages 182
ISBN: 99933-201-0-2
This book has showcased the IT Policy of Nepaland the six strategy papers covering three areasof critical importance such as universal access toinformation technology; education and train-ing; and IT applications in business andgovernment. The IT Strategy FormulationSteering Committee from National PlanningCommission has prepared this document in
order to make it useful to the IT stakeholders in the future and alsoit would aid them to reformulate the strategies and policies in thechanging domestic and international context. It may also give birthto an interest to other developing countries to learn from theprocess that is being adopted for policy design. For the smoothimplementation of policy, the committee has adopted a participa-tory process in which the government, private sector and civilsociety shared a common discussion forum during policy design.Such a process based on the accord of IT stakeholders would lead to‘goal congruence’ among them and thus facilitate successfuldevelopment of the IT sector.
Internet Governance: A Grand Collaboration
Lessons, Innovations and Perspectives of Informationand Communication Technologies in Development
Edited by: Don MacLean
Publisher: The United Nations Information and CommunicationTechnologies Task Force, pages 393
ISBN 3-03798-065-6
The book is the fifth publication of the United Nations ICT TaskForce series. The Task Force was established by Secretary GeneralKofi Annan to help identify ways to strap up the potential of ICTfor economic and social development by promoting partnerships of
public, private, non-profit and civil societystakeholders to advance the global endeav-our to bridge the digital divide.
The Task Force convened a GlobalForum on Internet Governance in New Yorkon March 25-26, 2004. The Task ForceSecretariat invited written contributionsfrom the international community to helpprepare the forum. Independent experts,
Internet practitioners and different stakeholdergroups submitted more than thirty papers in response to thisrequest. The aim of this collection is to present a selection of thesecontributions in relation to some of the main themes that emergedat the global forum and to highlight their essential messages. Thecontributions to the global forum have been organised into sixsections, which deal with Understanding the challenge; Evolutionof the Internet governance debate; Frameworks and definitions;Public policy issues; Technical issues and The way ahead.
Creating an Enabling Environment
Toward the Millennium Development Goals
Proceedings of the Berlin Global Forum of the UnitedNations ICT Task Force
Edited by: Denis Gilhooly
Publisher: The United Nations Information and CommunicationTechnologies Task Force, pages 292
ISBN 92-1-104533-9
The book covers key presentations andcontributions from the event held on 19-20November 2004. The papers address policyand regulatory issues, identify areas andmodalities for engaging stakeholders ininnovative partnerships, outline models andmodalities conducive to the elimination ofexisting financial mechanisms to meet thechallenges of ICT for Development.
The book is divided into two parts.The first part comprises of the proceedings of the Global Forum ofthe United Nations ICT Task Force on ‘Promoting an EnablingEnvironment for Digital Development’ held in November 2004and the second part is the result of ongoing work from the WorkingGroups of the UN ICT Task Force in the context of theMillennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs will nothappen without both the actions and the collaboration of allstakeholders working in a supportive enabling environment.
One-stop services to citizenIntegrated Citizen Service Centres as many are aware are one-stop centres wherevaried government services are made available, thus doing away with the needfor the citizen to travel to different locations interacting with different govern-ment departments. Bangalore One (B1) is an initiative of Government of Karna-taka that aims to redefine citizen-government interaction through its focus onintegrated citizen-centric services.
ICTD Project Newsletter
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Can you visualise a government officewithout a long queue outside? Can youthink of walking into a building andhaving access to multifarious govern-ment services through a single window?
This scenario is not a vision of thefuture but a reality of today, as it existsin some cities.
The era of e-Government has arrivedin India and governments are now in-creasingly decentralising responsibilitiesand processes and integrating citizenservices using ICT as a tool. Govern-ments now understand the power ofe-Government which can help them tocarry out activities more effectively in astructured manner, and in lesser spanof time.
Integrated citizen servicewith ICTNumerous studies have been conductedduring recent times which highlight theexpectations for superior service thatcitizens and businesses have from thegovernment. Integrated Citizen Servicesmay be a viable answer to this growingimpatience and urgency felt by peoplewho are not willing to waste their timeand energy chasing the governmentdepartments to get their work done.
Integrated Citizen Service Centres asmany are aware are one-stop centres,where varied government services aremade available, thus doing away with theneed for the citizen to travel to differentlocations interacting with different
government departments. Constitutedon the public-private partnership mostof the times, the government providesservices to citizens through a privatevendor who sets up kiosks and is paidon a transaction-cost model.
This change in relationships betweenthe government and the citizen frombeing primary bodies constitutedto serve the people, to providers ofservices and recipient customer doesthreaten to change social dynamics. Butthe transparency and accountability thatit builds into the government systemhelps assuage doubts about the role ofthe government. Numerous success sto-ries around the globe have reinforcedthe viability and need of establishingsuch centres.
Public sector organisations aroundthe world have adopted a number ofstrategies to improve both service accessand service quality. In Canada, effortswere undertaken to consolidate variedgovernment services in a single office.This concept of coordinating servicedelivery across branch, departmental,and jurisdictional boundaries wasbroadly defined as Integrated ServiceDelivery (ISD). Coordinating serviceswith several levels of government bymaking services available through newchannels such as the Internet ensuredgovernment services to be morecitizen-centric.
In Latin America, the vision of the‘Electronic Government Innovation andAccess’ (eGOIA) project is the provisionof a single virtual space supporting theinteraction of citizens (independent ofsocial status, gender, race, abilities andage) and the public administration in asimple, future-oriented and cost-effec-tive way. eGOIA aims to demonstratean e-Government system based on anopen services infrastructure in order to
June 2005
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allow the access of citizens through theInternet to integrated public services atseveral levels. The project began withthe demonstration of some integratedcitizen-centric e-Services based on acurrent set of public services. Theseservices were offered to a selected citi-zen user group in the newly establishedCitizen Access Points. Service usage isevaluated by monitoring the behaviourof selected user groups associated withthe assessment of the results. The les-sons learnt are passed to differentBrazilian regions/states and also toother countries (i.e. Peru and Portugal)to help in replication of the project.
In Philippines, the Philippine Bureauof Internal Revenue (BIR) has introducedan e-Governance programme as themain supporting tool of good govern-ance. The priority projects of the BIRas categorised per e-Governance frame-work are citizen focused government-to-citizen (G2C) services, web-basedgovernment-to-business (G2B) services,linking with other agencies’ systems forgovernment-to-government (G2G) andG2B services and integrated back officefor networking to field offices.
Another popular approach in manydeveloping nations is the establishmentof Multipurpose Telecentre (MPTC).MPCT’s offer integrated ICT services forthe rural communities along withInternet access services. Information
kiosks and knowledge centre in India,Thai Rural Net in Thailand, telecentre inBrazil, Warnet in Indonesia, PublicInformation centre in Albania, etc, aresome examples of MPTC’s. Interesting-ly, Bangladesh uses the same model ofMPTC, to provide employment to theunemployed youth and women commu-nity of their society.
India’s Integrated CitizenService Centre initiatives
India is never one to lag behind. In stepwith the world, India is effectively utilis-ing ICT for the welfare of citizens. Theinitiatives undertaken by Indian states
in this regard are noteworthy.One of the earliest initiatives in the
Integrated Citizen Services domain inIndia was e-Seva, implemented inHyderabad city, Andhra Pradesh. Thestate soon went on to become an e-Gov-ernance model for other states in thecountry. Some of the other projectsimplemented in Andhra Pradesh as apart of e-Governance were, ComputerAided Administration of RegistrationDepartment (CARD), Vijaywada OnlineInformation Centre (VOICE), e-Procure-ment System etc.
In Tamil Nadu, a pilot project called‘Sustainable Access in Rural India (SARI)Project’ was initially implemented inMelur taluk (sub-district administrativelevel) of Madurai district during
2003-04. Its aim was to help villagersharness the power of the Internet forsocial development, wealth creation, jobgeneration and to establish rural connec-tivity at a low cost. SARI was laterextended to 10 more districts andrenamed RASI (Rural Access Servicesthrough Internet). Touch screen Inter-net kiosks were installed throughpublic-private-partnerships in all taluksof the state.
Akshaya Project implemented by theKerala State IT Mission, aims to set up anetwork of 6000 information centres thatwould be able to impart basic IT literacyto at least one member in each of the 6.5million families of Kerala. Additionally,it will also provide services like dataentry, desk top publishing, computertraining and Internet telephony; gener-ate and distribute locally relevantcontent; improve public delivery of serv-ices for networking and computerisingthe 1214 local self-governing bodies toexpedite transactions like issue of certif-icates, licenses, tax collection etc. Theexisting centres are also being tappedto serve as Agri-business centres forproviding more services to the citizenssuch as agriculture related informationand services. These Agri-businesscentres will provide numerous agricul-ture related inputs to the farmers.
In Maharashtra, Integrated Citizen’sService Centres, SETU have been estab-lished in 25 district headquarters and 225taluka places. These centres provide allthe information related to collectoroffice. Several Wide Area Networks arealso being created for specific tasks.
Gujarat Gyan Ganga Project, ‘Swagat’(Online Grievance Redressal System) andMahiti Shakti in Panchmahal district areinitiatives in the state of Gujarat towardsproviding Integrated Citizen Services.All district headquarters have beenlinked with the Secretariat and all talu-kas are linked with district headquarters.
The West Bengal Government hasstarted government-to-citizen portalwhere anybody can download non-sale-able government forms and avail manyCredit: NISG
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more facilities through the Internet. 82information kiosks have been created toprovide services at a nominal fee. Threemajor hospitals have been connected torural hospitals to provide the benefits oftheir quality healthcare facilities to therural populace.
The State Government of HimachalPradesh has taken up the implementa-tion of ‘LokMitra’ project on a pilotbasis. Intranet set up has been built withservers at the district headquarters,connecting 25 Citizen InformationBooths located in the rural areas through-out the district.
Where the focus of government liesin providing varied services in onesingle centre, private agencies and thecivil society too are realising the roleICT’s can play in providing integratedservices to citizens. M.S. SwaminathanResearch Foundation (MSSRF) launchedthe Pondicherry ‘Information VillageResearch Project’ for the Pondicherryfishermen. ICT was the medium ofdelivering key services to these fisher-men. Computers were placed in thevillage centre and connected to theInternet through which regular weath-er reports of the Indian meteorologicaloffice could be accessed. The weatherreport is then broadcasted by loud-speakers and also through Very HighFrequency (VHF) radios enabling thefishermen to determine low and hightide before sailing off to the sea.
Integrated citizen services inKarnataka
The Government of Karnataka (GoK)has been striving to leverage ICTs toprovide global standard services to thecitizens of the state. Bhoomi and Rural
Digital Services are two such initiativesthat have touched the lives of the peoplein the state’s rural areas. Bangalore One(B1) is another initiative of GoK that
aims to redefine citizen-governmentinteraction through its focus on integrat-ed citizen-centric services. B1 has beenfunded mainly by the Ministry ofCommunications and InformationTechnology (MOCIT) and the UnitedNations Development Programmefunded ICTD Project being implement-ed by the National Institute for SmartGovernment (NISG).
Where governments have mostlybeen associated with endless waits andtangled red-tape, Bangalore One’s objec-tive is to make government transactionsa hassle-free exercise. Implemented ona Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) mod-el and run by a private consortium ofCMS Computers Ltd. and Ram Infor-matics, the vision of the B1 Project is ‘toprovide to the citizens of Karnataka, allG2C and G2B one-stop services and in-formation of departments and agenciesof Central, State and Local Governmentsin an efficient, reliable, transparent andintegrated manner on a sustained basis,
with certainty, through easy access to achain of computerised IntegratedCitizen Service Centers (ICSC’s) andthrough multiple delivery channels likeelectronic kiosks, mobile phones and theInternet’. Modeled after the highlysuccessful e-Seva project of Hyderabad,Andhra Pradesh, B1 aims to build on thesuccess of the project.
The B1 project was launched on 2ndApril 2005 with the inauguration of 14centres in Bangalore. With the openingof these centres, the citizens will not haveto stand in long queues to pay monthlyor other bills at conventional or manualcounters. They will be able to completetransactions in 10-15 minutes at thee-Kiosks in air-conditioned facility.Payments for other services such asstamps and registration, passport appli-cations, birth and death certificates,license renewal and traffic fines will alsobe available at the e-Kiosks, with eachcentre having 15 counters.
To make the e-Kiosks customer-friendly, the centres have been installedwith a TV set, coffee/tea vending ma-chines, Internet facility, an AutomatedTeller Machine (ATM) and a well-stackedcollection of newspapers, magazines andbooks. B1 aims to bring all G2C and G2Bservices under one roof to reduce thelaborious interface between citizens orbusiness people and the governmentoffices, except for specialised or complexservices.
Bangalore One Centre Counters Credit: NISGOld Electricity Bill Collection Centre
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NISG and i4d reserve the right to reprintarticles produced for the ICTD section ofthe i4d magazine and website, with duecredits to NISG and i4d. Please write tothe editor for any request of reprints.
Various departments of GoK likeBangalore Water Supply and SewageBoard (BWSSB), Bangalore ElectricitySupply Company (BESCOM), RegionalPassport Office (RPO), Regional Trans-port Office (RTO), Bangalore Mahana-gara Palike (BMP), Stamps andRegistration and Commercial Taxes areactively involved in the project. Theproject is initially providing approximate-ly 25 services of 7 government depart-ments and would eventually providealmost all the simple day-to-day servic-es (about 100 G2B, G2C and B2C servic-es) citizens require.
Some of the main objectives of theproject are as follows:• To provide 25 G2C services in a
convenient and efficient mannerthrough B1 service centres;
• To scale up the operations to covereventually all the G2C servicesthroughout Bangalore;
• To enhance the accountability,transparency and responsiveness tocitizen’s needs;
• To provide cost-effective methods ofservice provision;
• To manage the service provisionthrough partnership with a consorti-um of service providers to be select-ed through a competitive biddingprocess;
• To ensure speed and certainty ofproviding the services through
enforcement of a service level agree-ment with the selected partner;
• To enable the government depart-ments and agencies to focus on theircore functions and responsibilities byfreeing them from the routine opera-tions like collection of revenues andaccounting, issuing of certificates etc,and thereby enhance the overallproductivity of the administrativemachinery.B1 project will be evaluated periodi-
cally through independent agencies toascertain whether these objectives arebeing achieved, adopting an appropri-ate structured methodology like thee-Governance Assessment Framework(EAF) designed by the Department ofInformation Technology, Governmentof India. The purpose is to ensure thatthe project satisfies the basic tenets of ane-Governance project like people-orien-tation, scalability, replicability and cost-effectiveness in providing the services.
The futureIn the next phase, the number of Banga-lore One service centres would be scaledup to 50. The scope of the services pro-vided would also be expanded to about200 services which would include G2Band B2C services. Bangalore One is en-visaged to move to the smaller cities,towns and finally cover all the rural are-as of the state of Karnataka.
The implementation of IntegratedCitizen Services requires extensive workby the government. But, it is undoubt-edly a boon to the residents of anycountry. The Government of India hasrecognised the potential of this mediumin service delivery and has made it partof its National e-Governance Plan. Theplan envisages the creation of overhundred thousand Common ServiceCentres across the country, and predom-inantly in the rural areas. IntegratedCitizen Services not only present theopportunity for governments to offer itsservices to citizens in a better way, butalso helps citizens to reach out to thegovernment which is often consideredelusive and indifferent. This will changeforever the way people view, respondand interact with government.
References• Guillermo, Lilia C., BIR Takes Lead
In E-Gov’t Program, http://www.mctimes.net/Special_Reports-09162002-BIR%20Takes%20Lead%20in%20E-Govt%20Program.html
• http://nisg.org/projects/project_ICTD/ictd_pilot_projects_info.htm
• http://nisg.org/projects/project_bangaloreone/bangaloreone.htm
• http://www.bangaloreone.gov.in/pub-lic/aboutbone.aspx
• http://www.egoia.sp.gov.br/pub/folde-regoia-final.pdf
• http://www.iccs-isac.org/eng/ISD.htm• Rao, T.P. Rama, ICT and e-Govern-
ance for Rural Development http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/egov/documents/ict-and-egovernance-for-rural-development.pdf
• Shahid Uddin Akbar, ICT and SocialTransformation in Rural Bangladeshhttp://www.iimahd.ernet.in/egov/ifip/dec2004/article6.htm
Credit: NISG Bangalore One Centre - Vijaynagar
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Advanced capabilities in engineering and management of softwaresystems, services and applications, especially to support thecompetitive position of the European software industry, notablythe small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs) is the thrust of theIST Call 5 of Framework Programme Six of Euro India ICTCooperation (FP6). International co-operation is a core dimensionof the European Community’s effort in research and technologicaldevelopment. In the field of Information Society Technologies(IST), typically a global issue, international co-operation is a criticalmean towards strengthening the competitiveness of the Europeanindustry. It is primarily achieved through par-ticipation of organisations based outside theEuropean Union in the various activities of theIST Priority of the 6th Framework Programme.
The Euro-India ICT Co-operation in OpenSource Software and Embedded Systems Work-shop and Training programme was held in Kan-wal Rekhi School of Information Technology(KreSit), Indian Institute of Technology (IIT),Mumbai on 2-3 June 2005. It was a part of aseries of workshops on selected themes beingconducted as a part of the Project Monsoonunder the Euro-India ICT Co-operationprojects. Project Monsoon aims to bring betterinternational co-operation among the partnersin Europe and India.
The Euro-India ICT Co-operationInitiative is currently a network of over 1500European and Indian ICT community members worldwide. TheEuro-India portal www.euroindia-it.org is an extensive and wellorganised resource for institutions to find partners, offer expertiseand look for collaborative proposals.
The series of workshops that are being organised by Euro-IndiaICT Cooperation provide an excellent opportunity to learn the bidprocess, understand the priority areas and identify co-operatingpartners both for European proposers and Indian proposers.Specialists from the thematic areas also shared ideas and tried todevelop these concepts into project ideas, which could be built upinto proposals for fund-raising. Over 85 participants attended theworkshop in Mumbai.
In the opening plenary session, Hilary Hanahoe, Euro-IndiaICT Co-operation Project Co-ordinator, welcomed the delegateson behalf of the Euro-India ICT Co-operation Project. KrithiRamamritham, Head, KreSit, welcomed them on behalf of the host
organisation. Klaus Pendl, Directorate General of the InformationSociety and Media (International Relations) of the EuropeanCommission presented an introduction to the IST FP6 initiatives.Neeraj Suri, Professor, dependable embedded systems andsoftware, TU Darmstadt, Germany gave a European perspectiveon embedded systems and opportunities for Euro-Indiaco-operation. Anand Patvardhan, Executive Director, TechnologyInformation Forecasting and Assessment Council (TIFAC),provided insight to the core group on automotive research, which isan example of public-private relationship in ICT. The experts and
reviewers provided valuable insights on impor-tant points that need to be considered for mak-ing a successful bid.
Two parallel interactive workshops were heldon embedded systems and open sourcesoftware. The workshops were an enrichinglearning experience where the atmosphere wasopen sharing of ideas, expertise, and sessionsthat sought to clarify doubts of priority areasand bidding processes.
In the closing plenary session, IndraneelGhose, Science and Technology Advisor, dele-gation of the European Commission to India,Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal and Sri Lanka,presented co-operation opportunities with theEuropean Union. Subramaniam Vutha,Technology Law Forum, India, presented theperspective of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR)
in the fast evolving ICT domains. Ashok Kar and Surbhi Sharmaboth presented on the co-operation opportunities between Europeand India. The workshop finally ended with the closing remarks ofthe Euro-India ICT Co-operation Consortium and KReSIT.
e-Gov and i4d (www.egov.csdms.in and www.i4d.csdms.in), bothinitiatives of CSDMS (Centre for Science, Development andMedia Studies) are media partners in this cooperation, besidesINSEAD (www.inseadnovasia.com ).
Readers are welcome to write to [email protected] to learnmore or understand the process or to become a registered memberof the online community (registration is free of cost). The call forproposals is open up to September 21, 2005 at 1700 hours inBrussels time. The total indicative budget of the programme is 638million Euro.
Reported by Jayalakshmi Chittoor
EURO-INDIA ICT CO-OPERATION, 2-3 JUNE, MUMBAI, INDIA
Development throughco-operation
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NATIONAL WORKSHOP ON RIGHT TO INFORMATION ACT 2005, NEW DELHI, INDIA
Preparing toimplement successfullyIntroductionOn 12 May 2005, the Rajya Sabha (upper house of Parliamment)finally passed the keenly awaited Right to Information Bill. Withthe President’s assent, the Bill will finally come into force as the newnational Right to Information Act 2005. To assist Central and StateGovernments to prepare for implementation of the new Act, Com-monwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) organised a confer-ence on ‘Effective Implementation: Preparing to Operationalise theNew Right to Information Act 2005’ from 24-26 May 2005 inNew Delhi. The conference was designed to bring together govern-ment officials from the Centre and the States, as well as civil societyrepresentatives to focus on some of the key implementation issuesthat all stakeholders will have to consider. To facilitate discussionsand share experiences on challenges and good practices, CHRI alsoinvited international experts on RTI and its implementation fromMexico, UK, Canada, Jamaica and South Africa to act as resourcepeople. The first day was devoted to civil society consultation, whilethe next two days involved all stakeholders.
The Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) is anindependent, non-partisan, international non-governmental organ-isation, mandated to ensure the practical realisation of human rightsin the Commonwealth countries. Right to Information is one of itsimportant areas of work.
Conference themeThe focus of the conference was the new all India Right to Informa-tion law (RTI) which is probably one of the most important laws tobe passed since independence. The successful implementation ofthe law is directly linked to the level of commitment within govern-ment especially the commitment of the political leadership and thebureaucracy. This in turn directly correlates with their knowledgeand their understanding of the beneficial effects the new RTI Actwill have on overall governance. It is, therefore, imperative thatthere be immediate and wide scale dissemination of knowledgeabout the law. The burdens and enormity of the tasks ahead will bemuch ameliorated when civil society and government collaboratethrough strategic initiatives designed for effective implementation.
Clarifying responsibilities and commitmentsIt was noted at the onset of discussions that the government envis-aged that Central and State Acts could co-exist and that citizenswould have an option to apply under either Act. Where there is aconflict, the Central Act will prevail. Some participants felt that thisapproach could lead to complications, particular in terms of
practical processing of applications and complaints by publicofficials in the States. Some felt that some conflicts would have tobe decided by the courts. There was also some sense that if theCentral Act was well implemented, State Acts might eventuallysimply fade away.
Comparatively, it was noted that in Canada, Mexico andAustralia, each State has a separate Act with exclusive jurisdictionand the national access laws cover only national public bodies. Itwas agreed by participants that it would be very helpful for theCentral Government to clarify the position on how to implementthe Central Act in the States, particularly in those States that alreadyhave an Act.
Identifying key partnersThroughout the Conference, resource people and participantsrepeatedly stressed the importance of institutionalising collabora-tive and strategic partnerships. Aylair Livingstone, Director of theJamaican Access to Information Unit gave the example ofJamaica where immediately upon commencement of the RTI Act,the Access to Implementation Unit (ATI) sent out introductoryletters to MPs, the Opposition, civil society groups, human rightsorganisations, educational groups and the media. Phil Boyd, Assist-ant Information Commissioner from the UK Information Com-missioner’s Office said that in the UK, the Commission alsorecognised that building strategic relationships is the key to success-ful implementation.
Developing an Action PlanThe experience of both the national and international participantswho have been involved in implementing a new access law was veryilluminating. The new law contains a provision, which explicitlystates that the Act will come into force within 120 days of enact-ment. In Mexico, the UK and Jamaica, the implementing agencieswere given a time lag of 1-5 years to prepare for implementation. Soin real terms, implementation possess a huge challenge to bothCentral and State governments of India.
A key point emerging from the discussions was the importanceof a participatory process when developing an Action Plan.
Implementing proactive disclosureTwo themes dominated the discussion:• Effective implementation of the proactive disclosure require-
ments;• Publication of the information.
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Juan Pablo Guerrero Amparan, Information Commissioner withthe Mexican Federal Institute for Access to Public Information(IFAI) noted that, after poor initial implementation of the proactivedisclosure requirements under the Mexican law, some Ministersactually asked the Commission to help them deal with the situationand this gave the Commission an opportunity to standardiseinformation disclosure approaches. Mothusi Lepheana, Director ofthe Access to Information Unit in the South African Human RightsCommission noted that it is important to at least publish informa-tion on what information is available from government and whereit could be found. Marc Aurele Racicot, Assistant AdjunctProfessor, University of Alberta, Canada advised that immediatework should begin for developing a department directory of PublicInformation Officers (PIOs). This will be a very useful instrumentfor all citizens because it is like a map of Government, whichat least tells a citizen where he/she need to go to find a particularinformation.
The Chairperson of the Delhi Public Grievances Commissionnoted that they have been very active in using the Internet, withalmost every departments putting up information on the web.Some participants were concerned that too heavy a focus on theInternet was not appropriate considering the conditions of ruralIndia today, where connectivity is low.
Setting up of Information CommissionThe new law provides for the establishment of a Central Informa-tion Commissions as well as State Information Commissions through-out the country. There was considerable discussion regarding howthe structure for each of the different Indian Commissions wouldbe decided. The Mexican resource person stressed that essential toreal independence was budget autonomy. The UK resource personspecifically noted that the Office of the UK Information Commis-sioner has seen its role as a regulator facilitating good practice ratherthan as a tough enforcer of the law.
Running an information regimeParticipants discussed a range of relatively technical issues, many ofwhich appear minor but could have a serious impact on accessibil-ity in practice. The crux of the issue is that very simple proceduresneed to be developed in terms of payment, receipting and actuallyaccessing information. It was strongly recommended that a writtenreceipt be provided to all the requesters.
Training/Capacity buildingA consistent theme across all three days of the conference was thatthe training and capacity building for the officials responsible forproviding information to citizens is an essential pre-requisite for aneffective access regime. In Maharashtra, Yeshwantrao ChavanAcademy of Development Administration (YASHADA), the statetraining institute, has played a very important role in the imple-mentation of their access law, by providing effective trainingcourses for Government officials, especially PIOs.
MonitoringThe RTI Act clearly gives both Information Commissions and De-partments responsibility for monitoring implementation of the law.
In Canada, there is a quite sophisticated monitoring system, where-by all Departments are required to send the nodal agency monthlyreports. These are all collated and published on the Internet. InJamaica, the ATI Unit requires Departments to submit monthlyand quarterly reports, which the Unit reviews. In South Africa, theSouth Africa Human Rights Commission has a similar responsibil-ity to the Indian Information Commissions, because it provides anannual report based on other department’s annual reports.
Raising public awarenessIt was recognised that ideally civil society and Government couldwork together to raise public awareness and demonstrate therelevance of the law. Participants and resource people alike recog-nised that the media is an important group, which needed to beexploited to stimulate dialogue and raise the public awareness ofthe usefulness of the Act.
RecommendationsThe recommendations that came up from the conference:• The nodal agency responsible for implementation of the Act
must design an implementation process that is inclusive andtherefore should work in collaboration with multiple stakehold-ers, including State nodal agencies, other key departments,Administrative Training Institutes, civil society, the media,academics and international RTI officials;
• The Action Plan should identify what systems and tools need tobe developed to support implementation;
• The Information Commissions should be empowered to maketheir own procedural rules;
• Records management and archiving need to be reviewed andimproved as necessary;
• A directory of PIOs and other key officials responsible for imple-menting the Act should be collated and published as a matter ofabsolute priority;
• Rural people are the most critical target and so strategies need tobe developed for outreach in both the short and long term.
Reported by: Charmaine Rodrigues
Participants of the workshop Credit: CHRI
i4d | June 200542
May 2005 at BytesforAll discussion group, as usual, wasanother exciting and happening month with very interestingand insightful discussions, thanks to resourceful contributors.The following is the brief summary of various discussionthreads.
ICT4D
Introducing ICT4D project of SEBASociety for Economic & Basic Advancement (SEBA) of Bangla-desh has initiated a new project titled ICT for Development Pro-gramme, Bangladesh (ICTDP’B) to carryout various ICT4Dinitiatives. Under the new endeavour, SEBA is designing a businessmodel for Multipurpose Telecentre (MPTC) and piloting one cen-tre at Sonagazi, Feni. The MPTC is offering integrated servicesincluding education, communication, citizen services, health, busi-ness information, advisory services, etc. to the local communities.www.sonagazi.info
Rural India’s rough road to computer literacyIn a pilot installation in a village near Mumbai, India, students usePCs, donated by Via Technologies, to perform geometry home-work, while local women use computers to track their savings in amicro payment program. Later this month, college teachers fromaround India will take a three-week training course that will allowthem to replicate the program in other regions.http://news.com.com/Rural%20Indias%20rough%20road%20to%20computer%20literacy/210\0-1047_3-5700701.html?tag=nefd.lede
ICT accessibility
Indian firm plans cheap desktops worth $230Encore Software Ltd has plans to launch a range of cheap desktopscosting around $230 to $280, three years after it launched the$200 Simputer. These desktops are targeted mainly at the basicusers like students, small shop owners and educational institutions.http://in.news.yahoo.com//050510/137/5yhow.html
Indian language computingThe Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Commu-nications and Information Technology, Government of India’smission is to proliferate the use of Indian languages on computers,to overcome language barriers that restrict the nation’s path to knowl-edge and development. The DIT has invited individuals, public,private agencies and academic institutions to participate in a na-tional initiative in public-private partnership to launch and distrib-ute applications, tools, utilities and products developed for Indianlanguage computing.http://www.cdac.inhttp://www.ildc.gov.in
Bytes for All...
Bytes for All...
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100 $ LaptopThe Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media Lab islaunching a new research initiative to develop a $100 laptop. Thistechnology could revolutionise the education of the world’s chil-dren. The idea was announced by Nicholas Negroponte, Lab chair-man and co-founder, at the World Economic Forum at Davos,Switzerland in January 2005.http://www.media.mit.edu
Open Source
India eyes own open source licenseIn the seemingly never ending quest to balance openness withprofits, one of India’s more influential professors is devising yetanother open source licensing programme.http://news.zdnet.com/2102-3513_22-5701861.html?tag=printthis
Cuba to switch to open source softwareCuba will gradually switch to the open source Linux operatingsystem for its state computers, eliminating its exclusive use ofMicrosoft Windows, the government daily Juventud Rebeldereported. Roberto Del Puerto, director of the state office of infor-mation technology, said that Cuba already has about 1,500computers using the Linux system.http://uk.news.yahoo.com/050517/323/fj0v3.html
Toasted open sourceThe Shuttleworth Foundation has distributed Freedom Toastersaround South Africa so that anyone can copy open source software.Freedom Toasters are open source distribution points thatallow anyone to burn, or toast, software to a CD legally and for free,says Shuttleworth Foundation project manager Jason Hudson.http://www.sdnp.undp.org/perl/news/articles.pl?id=7739&do=gpage
bridges.org publishes software comparison studybridges.org study identifies harsh realities of using Free/Open SourceSoftware (FOSS) and proprietary software in public computer labsin Africa. The study was conducted by bridges.org in collaborationwith the International Development Research Council, the OpenSociety Institute, and SchoolNet Africa.http://www.bridges.org/software_comparison/report.html
Open Admin for Schools 1.80 releasedOpen Admin for Schools is a freely available web based schooladministration programme. It now includes an online grade book,and allows parent viewing of attendance, report cards, and gradebook, if desired. This is being developed by both the BattlefordsSchool Division and the North West Catholic School Division inSaskatchewan, Canada.http://richtech.ca/openadmin
Free software for digital library collectionsGreenstone, a UNESCO supported suite of software for buildingand distributing digital library collections provides a new way of
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 43
ytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bys for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bys for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bys for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bys for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bys for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bys for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...Bytes for All... Bytes for All...By
Bytes for All...
Bytes for All...organising information and publishing it on the Internet or onCD-ROM. Greenstone is produced by the New Zealand DigitalLibrary Project at the University of Waikato, and developed anddistributed in cooperation with UNESCO and the Human InfoNGO. It is open source, multilingual software, issued under theterms of the GNU general public license.http://www.greenstone.org/cgi-bin/library
Events and Announcements
$60,000 award for research on developmentThe medals for outstanding research on development carry cashprizes of $60,000 plus travel expenses to the Global DevelopmentNetwork’s seventh Annual Development Conference. Two prizemedals will be granted for complete research papers in each of fivetopic areas corresponding to the themes of the conference.http://www.gdnet.org
International 2005 ICT Student CompetitionThe International 2005 ICT student competition is sponsoredby the International Council for Caring Communities (ICCC)in co-operation with the United Nations ICT Task Force, theUnited Nations Programme on Ageing, the UN’s Departmentof Economic and Social Affairs, the Swiss Agency for Developmentand other partners.www.international-iccc.org
IPDC-UNESCO prize for rural communicationThe International Program for the Development of Communica-tion (IPDC)-UNESCO Prize is intended to recognise a meritoriousand innovative activity in improving communication in ruralcommunities, mainly in developing countries. The prize will beawarded during the twenty-fifth session of the IntergovernmentalCouncil of the IPDC.http://portal.unesco.org/
e-Content award 2005The e-Content Award 2005 has been introduced to select best e-Content for the World Summit Award 2005, scheduled at Tunisiaon coming November. This award is jointly sponsored by Ministryof Science and ICT, Government of Bangladesh in association withInternational Center for New Media (Austria).www.e-content.org
Site Watch
Reliefweb.intThis is a new website designed to help the internationalaid community improve the speed and effectiveness of reliefefforts by making it easier for decision makers to access criticallyneeded information on global emergencies and natural disasters ona 24/7 basis.http://www.reliefweb.int/
Bytes for All: www.bytesforall.org or www.bytesforall.netBytes for All Readers Discussion: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bytesforall_readersTo subscribe: [email protected] by Farah Mahmood, Bytes for All, Pakistan
Studies
The drover’s wife logs onThis study explores the Internet experiences of women living inrural and regional Australia, their motives for Internet uptake anduse, the benefits they gain from using the Internet, the difficultiesthey encounter in using it and whether the benefits are affected bytechnical factors, such as computer equipment and telecommuni-cation infrastructure, availability of opportunities for developingonline skills, and perceptions of the Internet.http://rights.apc.org.au/gender/2005/05/the_drovers_wife_logs_on.php
Who benefits more from e-Governance: Publicauthorities or citizens?The finding of an important study commissioned by EuropeanUnion and carried out by Capgemini, Netherlands and TNO-Strategy, Technology and Policy, is that e-Government does pay offand that back office changes are required to achieve results. Thestudy selected and studied in detail eight European exemplarypublic services from Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany,the Netherlands, Slovenia and Spain.http://www.eupan.org/cms/repository/documentDoes_e_gov_pay_off.zip
Miscellaneous
India is all set to become the new knowledge processoutsourcing (KPO) hubIndia is all set to become the new knowledge process outsourcing(KPO) hub, according to paper ‘India in the New KnowledgeEconomy’. The paper has revealed that KPO would grow at 46%to reach a staggering US$ 17 billion by 2010. Besides, the studypoints that the growth of services sector would be more than 8%and its contribution to India’s GDP would be more than 51%,affirming that India’s transition from being a BPO destination to aKPO destination is imminent.http://www.ciionline.org/news/newsMain.asp?news_id=592005103415AM&comment=posted
Euro-India ICT co-operationThe Euro-India ICT Co-operation initiative has published theEuropean and Indian ICT market background documents. Eachdocument has been compiled to offer European & Indian players abrief yet comprehensive overview of the European & Indian econ-omies, their marketplaces, and prospects in the ‘digital era’, therespective ICT markets - evolution, present status, performanceindicators, future outlook and much more.http://www.euroindia-it.org
i4d | June 200544
DISASTER FEATURE
MDGs and disasterDisasters have always been identified as anobstacle to achieve the development goals.The Millennium Development Goals(MDGs) touch upon areas like poverty,education, health, etc. which are closelylinked to vulnerability to natural hazards.
GOAL 1: Eradicating extremepoverty and hungerExtreme poverty and hunger lead to conse-quences like increasing the likelihood ofpopulations living in more hazard proneareas, having less protection against disasterimpact and lowering coping capacityduring and after the hazardous event. Thus,eradicating extreme poverty is harmonisedwith reducing risk of potential losses fromdisasters like drought, floods, cyclones andearthquakes. For this, the microfinanceinstitutions can offer its members a varietyof micro insurance packages as Self-Em-ployed Women’s Association (SEWA) ofIndia has done in the aftermath of theGujarat earthquake in 2001.
GOAL 2: Achieving universalprimary educationDisaster occurrences greatly hamper theeducation process in many ways, withhuman loss and injury, social upheaval,school property damage and closings, andoften with children having to leave schoolfor long periods in the recovery period.Some of the children do not get anotherchance to attend school, which deepens thevicious cycle of lack of education and vul-nerability. In many earthquakes around theworld, school buildings collapsed, causingsevere setback to primary education. Socountries like Turkey, Colombia, India andIndonesia have started to incorporateseismic safety standards into new schoolbuilding constructions.
GOAL 3: Promoting genderequality and empoweringwomenWomen are frequently, disproportionatelyand negatively affected by disaster impact
and can also face targeted gender-basedviolence and exploitation in the aftermathof disasters. Women are often left out offormal planning and decision making fordisaster recovery affairs.
GOAL 4: Reducing childmortality (children below theage of five)Infants and young children are among themost vulnerable segments of any givenpopulation. In the aftermath of disasters,interrupted basic infrastructure, stretchedemergency and health care facilities, theoutbreak of disease epidemics, and theloss or injury of care givers and incomeearners, make young children even moresusceptible to physical and emotionaltrauma.
GOAL 5: Improving maternalhealthIn households where basic needs are hardlymet, the pressure of post-disaster impact caneliminate the possibility of adequate mater-nal care. Pregnant woman are often at highrisk from death/injury in disasters. Increasedresponsibilities and workloads create stressfor surviving mothers.
GOAL 6: Combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and otherdiseasesHIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases ofepidemic proportions make infected popu-lations more vulnerable in the wake ofdisaster. With basic infrastructure beingdamaged and interrupted, water-borne andinsect vector diseases can escalate rapidly,which severely hampers recovery anddevelopment efforts. Additionally, overbur-dened health care facilities can make regulartreatments impossible.
GOAL 7: Ensuringenvironmental sustainabilityThe link between environmental degrada-tion and disaster occurrence is well recog-nised. Degradation of the resource base leads
Strategies proposed by theMillennium ProjectThe report entitled ‘Investing in develop-ment: A practical plan to achieve theMillennium Development Goals’ of theUN Millennium Project has recommend-ed the following five-fold strategy forreducing losses from disasters:• Strategies to reduce disaster losses need
to be mainstreamed in poverty reduc-tion strategy papers;
• Infrastructure investment to incorpo-rate disaster risk reduction efforts;
• Social safety nets for the vulnerable, par-ticularly through government provi-sions;
• Early warning capacities and informa-tion campaigns supported by govern-ments;
• Pre-crisis emergency and contingencyplanning.
directly to less access to resource-basedlivelihoods and migration to marginal andoften more hazard-prone areas. Strategies likeprior environmental impact assessments ofall developmental projects, participatorymanagement of biodiversity and ecosystemresources can contribute to break the chainof accumulated risk.
GOAL 8: Developing a globalpartnership for developmentMainstreaming disaster risk reductioncontinues to gain momentum at all levelswith development efforts increasinglyincluding risk reduction considerations andrisk reduction initiatives further incorporat-ing wider development viewpoints. TheWorld Summit for Sustainable Develop-ment (WSSD) process has formally linkeddisaster risk reduction with global develop-ment efforts. Disaster reduction has also beena part of the national, regional and globalmeetings of the Programme of Action forSmall Island Developing States (SIDS).
Source: http://www.unisdr.org/eng/mdgs-drr/
review-8mdgs.htm
June 2005 | www.i4d.csdms.in 45
Botswana31 August-02 September, 2005World Information Technology ForumGaboronewww.witfor.org
Canada27 June-02 July, 2005ED-MEDIA 2005, Montrealhttp://www.aace.org
24-28 October, 2005E-Learn 2005Vancouver, British Columbiahttp://www.aace.org/conf/eLearn/call.htm
China06 July, 2005IEEE 3rd International Workshop onTechnology for Education in DevelopingCountries, Taiwanhttp://ifets.massey.ac.nz/tedc2005
Finland27-29 June, 2005Landscapes of ICT and SocialAccountability, Turkuwww.cs.utu.fi/ifip/WG9.2_Conference_2005
Italy11-15 July, 2005OSS2005International Conferenceon Open Source SystemsGenovahttp://oss2005.case.unibz.it
27-28 October, 2005Lesser Used Languages & ComputerLinguisticsBolzanohttp://www.eurac.edu/Org/LanguageLaw/
Multilingualism/Projects/Conference2005.htm
Tanzania12-14 August, 2005WYDI 2005World Youth, Development and ICTConferenceArushahttp://www.wydi2005.tk
Tunisia16-18 November, 2005WSIS: World Summit on theInformation SocietyPhase 2, Tunishttp://www.itu.int/wsis
United Kingdom22-24 June, 2005First International Conference one-Social ScienceManchesterhttp://www.ncess.ac.uk/conference_05.htm
10-12 July, 2005Euro Conference on Mobile GovernmentSussex UniversityBrightonhttp://www.icmg.mgovernment.org/
europeanmg.htm
14-16 July, 20056th International Women into ComputingConferenceGreenwichhttp://www.wic.org.uk/conference
United States14-17 July, 2005EISTA ’053rd International Conference on Educationand Information Systems: Technologies andApplicationsOrlando, Floridahttp://www.confinf.org/eista05/website/default.asp
23-25 September, 200533rd Research Conference on Communi-cation, Information and Internet PolicyArlington, Virginiahttp://www.tprc.org/TPRC05/2005.htm
Nigeria25-28 July, 2005Conference on Bridging the Digital andScientific Divide, Abujahttp://www.fmst-nnvs.com/
Republic of Korea23-24 June, 2005 WSIS Thematic Meeting on Multi-Stake-holder Partnerships for Bridging the Digit-al Divide, Seoulhttp://www.itu.int/osg/spu/ni/wsisbridges
Slovenia19-21 October, 2005e-Challenges e-2005, Ljubljanahttp://www.echallenges.org/2005
South Africa04-07 July, 20058th World Conference on Computers inEducation, Stellenboschwww.wcce2005.org.za
24-26 August, 2005CIRN2005The 2nd Annual Conference of theCommunity Informatics Research NetworkCape Townhttp://www.cirn2005.org
Spain06-08 July, 20057th ISKO-Spain ConferenceBarcelonahttp://www.bd.ub.es/isko2005
Switzerland28 June-01 July, 2005ITU WSIS Thematic Meeting onCybersecurity, Genevahttp://www.itu.int/osg/spu/cybersecurity
Get your event listed here. www.i4d.csdms.in/events
What’s on
i4d | June 200546
IN FACT
Policy panoramaA coherent national ICT policy is necessary for the development ofsustainable and effective infrastructure and also for reducing waste ofresources. Most of the Asian countries have distinct policies of their ownto ensure that they can take the full advantage of the technical opportu-nities available to them and exploit them for economic development.
AfghanistanThe Ministry of Communications, Government of Afghanistanhas prepared ‘Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)- Policy Paper’ to enable Afghanistan to draw benefit from ICT byfully becoming part of the global information society. The govern-ment wants to use ICT to improve government and social servicesand foster the rebuilding process.http://www.export.gov/afghanistan/pdf/ict_policypaper.pdf
BangladeshThe Ministry of Science and Information and CommunicationTechnology, Government of Bangladesh has drafted NationalInformation and Communication Technology (ICT) Policy. ThisPolicy aims at building an ICT-driven nation comprising ofknowledge-based society by the year 2006.http://www.bccbd.org/html/itpolicy.htm
BhutanThe ‘Bhutan Information and Communications Technology Policyand Strategies (BIPS)’ of the Royal Government of Bhutan wasdrafted with the overall policy objectives to use ICT for goodgovernance, to create a Bhutanese info-culture and to create a‘High-Tech Habitat’.http://www.dit.gov.bt/guidelines/bips.pdf
CambodiaThe Government of Cambodia through the ICT policy want tonarrow the digital divide. The advancement in technologies haspushed the disparities between different geographical regions ofthe country broader. While the cities like Phnom Penh have mobiletelephones, Internet access and other value added services,remote provinces are still not having enough basic analoguetelephone systems.http://www.apdip.net/projects/2004/kh-la-epolicies/kh/DraftPolicy.pdf
Hong Kong, ChinaLegislative Council Information Policy Panel of Hong Kong hasprepared ‘Development of Information Infrastructure in HongKong’ for the development of the physical infrastructure and touch-es on the promotion of the effective use of that infrastructure forpossible applications.http://www.ofta.gov.hk/mis/rp97a231.html
IndiaIn May 1998, the Prime Minister of India formed a NationalTaskforce on Information Technology and Software Developmentto formulate a long term National IT policy for the country. TheTaskforce submitted three key reports to the government.IT Action Plan - I: Software IThttp://www.nasscom.org/download/action_plan_1.pdfAction Plan - II: Hardware IThttp://www.nasscom.org/download/action_plan_2.pdfAction Plan - III: Long Term National IT Policyhttp://www.nasscom.org/download/action_plan_3.pdf
IndonesiaMinistry of Communication and Information (MCI), Governmentof Indonesia has drafted ‘Promoting Internet Policy and RegulatoryReform in Indonesia’ to facilitate the growth of Internet inthe country. In most parts of the country, there is a problem ofaccessibility.http://www.internews.fr/documents/ICT_Dev_Indonesia_2003.pdf
JapanThe Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications has designed‘Vision 21 for Info-Communications’ to evolve a more sophisticat-ed system of info-communications. Japan is highly developed ininformation and communication technology.http://www.soumu.go.jp/joho_tsusin/policyreports/english/telecouncil/v21-9706/v21-9706-e.html
PakistanThe guiding theme for the IT policy of Pakistan drafted by IT andTelecom Division is that the government has to be the facilitatorand an enabler to let the private sector drive the development in ITand Telecommunications.http://www.pakistan.gov.pk/divisions/ContentListing.jsp?DivID=9&cPath=81_85_237
PhilippinesThe ‘National Information Technology Plan 2000’ (NITP2000)of Philippines documents an overall strategy to spur the country toglobal competitiveness through information technology diffusion.http://www.sdnbd.org/sdi/issues/IT-computer/policy/philippines.pdf
ThailandThe National Information Technology Committee has drafted‘Social Equity and Prosperity: Thailand IT Policy into the 21stCentury’ to harness the full potential of IT for the socio-economicdevelopment of the country.http://www.nitc.go.th/it-2000/full.en.html
Map India 200630 January – 2 February, New Delhi
www.mapindia.org
Map Asia 200522-25 August, Jakarta
www.mapasia.org
Map Middle East 200626-29 March, Dubai
www.mapmiddleeast.org
Can you afford to miss [email protected]
For more details, please contact:
Conflux SecretariatG - 4, Sector - 39, Noida - 201 301, IndiaTel +91-120-2502180 to 87, Fax: +91-120-2500060Web www.conflux.csdms.in, E-mail [email protected]
Organisers Host state
Co-organisers
Government ofNCT of Delhiknowledge for change
GPSe ovThe bimonthly magazine on e-Governance www. i4d .csdms. in
CommonwealthCommonwealthBUSINESSBUSINESS
Promoting Global Trade & Investment
Institutional partner
Media partners
ISPAIInternet Service Providers Association of India
Supported by
e-Government: Evolution or Revolution?
w w w . c o n f l u x . c s d m s . i nw w w . c o n f l u x . c s d m s . i nw w w . c o n f l u x . c s d m s . i nw w w . c o n f l u x . c s d m s . i n
The e-Government Conferencee
e
2005
e e
ConfluxConfluxConflux
The Grand New Delhi
17 - 19 October, 2005
About Conflux 2005
Participant profile
Key administrators/e-Government practitioners from the following
bodies:
! Central Government
! State Governments
! Local authorities
! Government agencies and other relevant government organisations
! Corporates providing e-Government services
! Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) including ICT companies
providing e-Government and e-Commerce solutions
! Politicians
! Bureaucrats
! Chambers of commerce and other associations
! Community leaders
! Community-based organisations
Conflux 2005 is a three day conference and exhibition being organised by Centre for Science, Development and Media Studies (CSDMS) and GIS Development, in collaboration with Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi.
The objective of the event is to showcase e-Government developments in India and other parts of the world and learn from the successful practices in the region. The conference will serve as a platform to bring experts from various countries, key government representatives, industry, academia and grassroot NGOs all together to discuss and bring forth the key issues related to the e-Governance.
Key sectors to be addressed• Land records • Income tax/Commercial tax• Registration services • Treasuries automation• Transport • Police departments• Municipal e-Government • Postal department• Passport department • Citizen services
Key topics• Open Source• Benchmarking tools and evaluation methodologies• Public private partnership models• International best practices• National e-Government Action Plan
Key sessions• Rural governance models• Citizen service centres• Local content for local governance• Role of civil society organisations in e-Government• Right to information vs. duty to publish
Paper submission deadlineAbstracts July 30, 2005Acceptance August 07, 2005Full paper August 30, 2005
Important contactsGeneral enquiry/Information [email protected]/papers submission [email protected] [email protected]/exhibition [email protected]
Department of Science and Technology
