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initiatives
This
page considers particular digital divide initiatives in
the developing world.
It covers -
global crusades
As of mid 2000 there were more internet users in affluent
Sweden in the entire African continent and, allegedly, more
in the UK than in Latin America and the Caribbean. At times
it is difficult to escape the impression that there are
almost as many global initiatives, media releases and position
papers ... or that money spent on tasteful conferences would
wire several of the smaller third world countries (or pay
for better sanitation and education).
In 2000 the G8+1 nations and Organisation of Economic Cooperation
& Development (OECD) announced the establishment of
a Digital Opportunity Task Force or Dotforce (DOT),
using funds from the World Bank and United Nations Development
Program to "eliminate the digital divide".
The May 2001 final report (txt)
essentially restated its terms of reference and as a result
has been tartly criticised - for example in the evaluation
by Russell Southwood of African NGO Balancing Act. The DOT
subsequently released another report (PDF)
in June 2002 - unfortunately more of the same - before being
subsumed by the UN Task Force on Information & Communication
Technologies.
That body's Plan
of Action - which as of March 2005 does not appear to
have resulted in much substantive activity other than international
gatherings - explains that
The Task Force will not develop operational or implementing
capacity but rather seeks to build upon existing, emerging
and new initiatives and activities and focuses on adding
value to them by helping to coalesce and scale up these
efforts and by facilitating and supporting coordination
and collaboration among all stakeholders. The ICT Task
Force can add value in a number of strategically important
ICT related areas. Specifically, this will include achieving
greater coherence among existing and emerging implementation
mechanisms: global advocacy services; catalytic interventions
on ICT related policies; stakeholder consultations; innovative
partnerships among various stakeholders; comprehensive
awareness campaigns; development of participatory and
inclusive governance arrangements; the full integration
of ICT in development portfolios; monitoring and reassessment
of what is involved in bridging the digital divide; collecting
and sharing best practices and lessons learned, including
on regulatory environment and facilitating better formulation
of programmes and projects; helping remove bottlenecks;
promoting transitional mechanisms; and streamlining the
mobilization of resource flows, thus bringing additional
vigor and coherence to this global endeavor. A High level
Panel of Advisors composed of a roster of ICT leaders
and experts to serve as resource persons, will be maintained,
and will be called upon by the Task Force to assist with
specific goals and programmes, in particular in monitoring
technology developments, identifying the resultant needs
and suggesting policy options to deal with these new issues.
Within this general framework, the ICT Task Force will
seek to advance the broad, internationally agreed development
goals and targets of the United Nations, in particular
those set up by the Millennium Declaration. Eradication
of poverty and the special needs of the least developed
and low-income countries and Africa will constitute the
principal focus and benchmark for all activities of the
Task Force. To this end, the Task Force will seek to promote
the creation "of an environment - at the national
and global levels alike - which is conducive to
development and to elimination of poverty"
Bureaucratically impeccable and consistent, alas, with the
dour conclusions in Shirley Hazzard's Defeat of an Ideal: A
Study of the Self-destruction of the United Nations
(London: Macmillan 1973) and Countenance of Truth
(London: Chatto 1990).
There is more substance in the Bridges report
on Spanning the Digital Divide: Understanding & Tackling
the Issues and Mike Jensen's report
on The Status Of The Internet In Africa, both mid-2001.
The glitzier Digital Divide Task Force (DDTF) - subsequently
repackaged as the Global Digital Divide Initiative (GDDI)
- is an initiative of the World Economic Forum, essentially
advising that big business group.
Its report notes that
at
our Annual Meeting 2001 in Davos, we shared these stories
and reviewed our action-oriented work programme with the
same group of top executives that launched the Initiative.
Action-oriented
it might be, but the Force has so far produced few results,
as might be expected from a perusal of Lewis Lapham's tart
The Agony of Mammon: The Imperial Global Economy Explains
Itself to the Membership In Davos, Switzerland (London:
Verso 1998). As of January 2002 it was still
developing
concrete proposals in the domains of education, connectivity
and regulatory frameworks.
By
March 2005 those proposals had apparently disappeared from
the agenda.
The US Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) and Brussels-based
Internews more usefully established a Global Internet Policy
Initiative (GIPI),
a foundation formed to help developing countries create
policies that narrow the divides.
The UN Task Force on Information & Communication Technologies
(UNICT)
- 18 representatives of member states, eight private sector
representatives, four representatives from the non-profit
sector and six representatives from the UN system - has
been slow to get off the ground. It is largely a response
to the Dotforce and so far has been even more bureaucratic.
A more practical approach is evident in the work of the
Network Startup Resource Center (NSRC), concerned with appropriate
networking technology in Asia, Africa, Latin America, the
Caribbean, the Middle East and Oceania. One highlight is
its Tools, Tactics, and Resources for ISPs collection.
The Digital Opportunity Initiative (DOI),
a partnership between Accenture, the US Markle Foundation
and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), has been
a little less bureaucratic than the UN Task Force on IT.
It released a report
in July 2001 on Creating a Development Dynamic and
an announcement
in February 2002 that it has been renamed the Global Digital
Opportunity Initiative (GDOI) -
This
initiative is now poised to take action in concert with
all key national stakeholders to create a dynamic policy
framework for development.
It
features the usual digital great & good - Esther Dyson,
Sun, Hewlett-Packard, Cisco, AOL Time
Warner, the Harvard Center for International Development
and Grameen Bank.
Technology Pioneers (TEN),
another offshoot of the World Economic Forum, serves as
a 'business angel' for the development sector organisations.
Several organisations for individuals have sprung up. These
include Canada's
NetCorps, TechCorps (TC),
GeekCorps (GC),
WorldCorps (WC)
and VolunteerMatch (VMatch).
The October 2000 Digital Dividend (DD)
conference in Seattle, under the auspices of Washington
think tank the World Resources Institute (WRI),
was marketed as "transforming sustainable development
through digital technology". It is independent of the
more business-oriented Digital Divide partnership
(DDO)
associated with William Gates Sr.
InterConnection donates sites, hosting, harware, software
and training to community groups in the underdeveloped world.
Competitor Close
the Gap proclaims that it
aims
to contribute towards closing the digital divide between
the north and the south by using the existing potential
of people. By activating existing local talent, Close
the Gap supports the (re)construction of African countries.
In other words, Close the Gap does not provide development
aid but reacts to a real existing demand.
In
practice it is an opportunity for businesses to donate used
IT equipment, which is checked, repaired and provided to
the Third World. That looks good in annual reports and other
corporate promo; it also helps donors get round pesky EU
e-Waste restrictions.
The international Building Digital Opportunities Programme
is funded by the UK Department for International Development
(DFID), the French Directorate General International Cooperation
(DGIS) and the Swiss Agency for Development & Cooperation
(SDC).
On the left the Association for Progressive Communications
(APC) seeks
to
defend
and promote non-commercial, productive online space for
NGOs and collaborate with like-minded organisations to
ensure that the information and communication needs of
civil society are considered in telecommunications, donor
and investment policy.
University
of Michigan guru C K Prahalad, endorsing claims by GSM
vendors that taxation of mobile hardware and calls is maintaining
digital divides, commented that
It
is clear that the defining change in the world's poorest
economies will be led by revolution in access to communications
and not,as in the world's most advanced economies,by the
evolution of IT. Economic and rapid network build times
and high consumer demand combine to make mobile communications
not a replacement for PC and fixed-line telecommunications
but the only way by which billions of people in the world
will access not only voice and simple text services but
ultimately the whole range of content and applications
that are enjoyed in developed economies. This transformation
will drive the growth of these economies. Communications
is as much a part of the underlying infrastructure upon
which economic and social advancement depends as roads,
schools and banks. Governments must create the conditions
for the rapid and complete access to communications that
society needs.
autarchic visions
Some enthusiasts aim to bridge third world divides by providing
ultra-low price devices such as the VillagePDA, Simputer
or Hundred Dollar Laptop. Such initiatives are explored
in more detail elsewhere on this site.
In essence, they pose questions about markets, donor relations
and - most importantly - appropriate technologies. Although
announcements about particular devices have attracted considerable
attention and added lustre to personal/institutional profiles
few machines have got into the hands of intended users.
It is arguable that those users would gain greater benefit
from other technologies such as print or from measures such
as paying the salaries of teachers.
incubators
In contrast to the traditional focus on non-commercial connectivity
BusyInternet
is a US 'incubator' building telecentres
in West Africa that offer community net access (typically
100 computers), a learning center for seminars and office
space for net-related businesses.
high tech extravaganzas
The Little Intelligent Communities (LINCOS)
initiative, developed by MIT and a Costa Rican institution,
takes a different track - providing shipping containers
that include
a
computer science laboratory, a telemedicine unit, a videoconference
centre, an information center with electronic trade possibilities,
and communitarian electronic mail and newspaper
LINCOS
has gathered suitable headlines but critics have noted concerns
about sustainability and operating costs, asking whether
more appropriate technology might include a simple printing
press and a stipend for several doctors rather than paying
for bandwidth for videoconferencing. They have sniffed that
notions of 'Cambridge Mass, in a box' in practice are little
more than MIT on the box ... on US television and in uncritical
coverage on sites such as Slashdot.
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