Eldis: Sharing the best in development policies, practices and research
Eldis is a website that aims to share the best practices in development policy, practice and research. It is part of the knowledge services by the Institute of Development Studies, Sussex. Eldis is core funded by Swedish Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), The Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD), Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and Department for International Development (DFID), Government of United Kingdom.
The Eldis outputs
Eldis contains more than 24,000 summarised documents from over 4,500 development organisations. These documents are available free for downloading. Eldis also carries country profiles, email newsletters, news feeds, events, and 24 subject-focused resource guides. The site could be visited at www.eldis.org
The Target
Eldis focuses on materials that are of strategic, policy or practical interest for development practitioners based in both the North and the South. The target audience includes development professionals, donor agency staff, policy-makers, NGOs, researchers, students, information workers, development communicators, and development-focused web-service providers.
Focus on ICTs and Telecentres
The website has several sections on Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) and telecentre related development issues. It carries useful links in this regard. Also, there is a section in the website dedicated to online training on how to use the Internet for research, with useful and effective links to related topics.
Here, we carry some knowledge resources related to ICT and telecentre from Eldis.
Wikis, Webs, and Networks: Creating connections for conflict-prone settings
Author: Rebecca Linder
Publisher: The Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), 2006
Pages: 61
Source:http://www.eldis.org/go/topics/resource-guides
/ict-for-development&id=23742&type=Document
This is a Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) report that looks at ways in which connectivity between various actors in conflict-prone settings could be improved. Despite increasing national and international interventions in conflict zones, success has eluded the actors due to problems of communication and connectivity, which prevents the expertise of one intervention from adequately reaching the other operations. The actors, both international and local, possess critical information but do not have an effective means of communicating with each other. The report, therefore, recommends ways in which this communication and connectivity could be improved; and ways in which the local population could be equipped to prevent and mitigate conflict and help rebuild the community and country. The target audience of this report includes civilians, the military, the public and private sectors, and national and international agencies.
The report equates connectivity with the capacity of individuals and organisations to interface. There should be open sharing of ideas, innovations and information; and the community should generate, share and interpret the content. Lead users should be identified and their practices promoted for the effectiveness of the entire community to be enhanced. Certain guidelines are outlined for institutions to adjust and update policies, invest in appropriate communications infrastructure, and facilitate cultural shifts.
It is stated that Communities of Practice (CoPs), or networks of practice, provide ways to enhance social learning by means of networks. CoPs constitute of groups of professionals who share information and advice on a particular topic to solve problems. These CoPs can also act as training seminars, conference series, and websites. Such networks make boundaries between organisations permeable, as documented in Kosovo. The UN-run municipality in Kosovo, with a more networked structure, was more effective than the traditionally hierarchical municipality, despite similar conditions.
The report explores three new trends in information sharing applicable in conflict-prone settings: online social networking (Facebook, Orkut, MySpace, Linkedln, etc. are examples of popular online social networking sites), wikis, and tagging. Wikis are collaborative websites or softwares that allow users to add and edit content. Information is available real-time and generated by people who need not know each other or have geographic proximity. Tagging is a tool whereby users can mark a piece of data with any number of keywords (tags). These tags could be used by other users to seek further pieces of information.
Another suggestion is to have central hotlines to expand the existing capability of phone networks. Through this, experts can provide detailed advice to callers or redirect them to an individual or organisation capable of help. For instance, operators would inform callers of road closings and planned demonstartions, and provide alternative routes.
Keeping Up With Technology: The use of mobile telephony in delivering community-based decentralised animal health services in Mwingi and Kitui Districts, Kenya
Authors: James Kithuka, Jacob Mutemi, and Ali Hassan Mohamed
Publisher: Farm-Africa, 2007
Pages: 34
Source:http://www.eldis.org/go/topics/resource-guides/ict-for-development/access-and-infrastructure-initiatives/telecentres-and-kiosks&id=36158&type=Document
Faced with a continual decline in the number of veterinary personnel after the World Bank and International Monetary Fund recommended Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) in the 1980s, FARM-Africa implemented the Kenya Dairy Goat and Capacity Building Project (KDGCBP) in Mwingi and Kitui Districts, in 2004, to improve farmer livelihoods in rural Africa. Subsistence-oriented production system, poor awareness of animal health, combined with a poor communication and transport infrastructure, required that an alternative animal health delivery service system be implemented in the Arid and Semi-Arid Land region. A system incorporating a network of Community Animal Health Workers (CAHWs), Animal Health Assistants (AHAs) and Veterinary Surgeons was introduced. For effective communication at all levels within the network, FARM-Africa approached the Safaricom Foundation (SF) to provide a telecommunications infrastructure which used mobile phones and community pay phones.
In order to develop an effective Community-Based Decentralised Animal Health (CBDAH) service delivery system, it was decided to link key participants with a telecommunications infrastructure. The article reports that the telecommunications system has enabled the animal health care service providers to keep one another updated on animal health issues, share information on availability of essential veterinary drugs, and engage in a cost-effective and quickest referral system. It has also contributed to a reduction in transaction costs of farmers and veterinary transport, besides saving time. For example, transport costs have reduced for the CAHWs as they are able to make case referrals and diagnosis over the phone. Farmers now use SMS (using their own or the CAHWs' mobile phones) or the community phones to contact a CAHW, AHA or veterinary doctor instead of having to walk very long distances to consult them. Beneficiaries (farmers and livestock traders) are now more informed about disease occurrences and developments in the livestock market.
The mobile phones, in addition, have also increased the social capital of the CAHWs, AHAs and veterinary doctors and have helped the CAHWs to cover a greater area (each CAHW is currently serving an average of 300 households). Drug sales and the number of services rendered have also increased thereby increasing the incomes of the CAHWs, AHAs and veterinary professionals. In the first year (September 2005 to August 2006) a total of 12,707 cases generated an income of 571,201 Kenya Shillings for the CAHWs. The community pay phones have also helped the AHAs and private vets to diversify their income.
Asia-Pacific Telecommunication/ICT Indicators 2008
Broadband in Asia Pacific: too much, too little?
Prepared by: International Telecommunication Union
Source: http://www.itu.int/publ/D-IND-AP-2008/en
Price: 69 CHF
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) released the seventh edition of its key document, `The Asia-Pacific Telecommunication/ICT Indicators 2008 Broadband in Asia-Pacific: too much, too little', during the ITU Telecom Asia 2008 (Bangkok, Thailand, September 2 to 5, 2008). The report, considered to be an invaluable reference book for policy makers, analysts, investors and observers about telecommunication and broadband facts and figures of the region, gives an overview of the recent developments in the telecommunication sector of the region. Focusing on the recent market trends in the telecommunication sector including in the area of fixed, mobile and Internet connections, the document encompasses a whole gamut of issues in the telecommunication sector like the ones related to policies, technologies, competition, pricing, access and applications.
One of the highlights of the report is that it not only brings to the fore government policies vis-à-vis broadband connectivity issues that may serve as best practices examples, but it also addresses and analyses the issue of digital divide while going on to draw some conclusions as well as making some recommendations to sustain the growth and deepen the access to ICT in the region. The report is a compilation of some 20 regional tables covering key telecommunication/ICT indicators, 43 individual country pages with a five year profile from 2002-2007, and a directory with names of telecommunication ministers and operators in the region.
The report terms the performance of Asia-Pacific region in development of ICT as mind boggling considering that the Asia-Pacific is home to almost half of world's fixed landline phones (48%), over one billion mobile cellular subscribers (1.4 billion) and has the largest share in the world's mobile phone market (39%). That apart, the region also stands out in terms of advanced Internet technology, including broadband Internet access and mobile data communications. The report observes that the Asia-Pacific region, with many of the world's leading broadband economies, and with adoption of sound policies and high levels of investment, is witnessing thriving and highly competitive markets.
However, the report expresses concern about the digital divide that the region is experiencing in an unprecedented way. In particular, the stark contrast between the region's high income and low and lower-middle income economies in terms of expansion of broadband connectivity and cost-effectiveness and penetration of Internet access concerns the report. The report observed, among other things, that at the end of 2007, there were 119 million mobile broadband subscribers, a large majority of whom are from the upper-middle and high income economies. Only a few of the low and lower-middle income economies like Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Philippines and Maldives have launched mobile broadband networks (WCDMA). China and India, the two biggest mobile markets, had yet to launch a mobile broadband networks.
The report identified the lack of international Internet bandwidth as a problem in landlocked and other countries without direct access to international fibre optics cable system. To tackle these and accelerate broadband development, the report urged the policy makers to: establish broadband strategies and policies, with meaningful goals and targets, implementation plans and incentives to achieve rapid broadband deployment; move quickly to award spectrum for wireless broadband such as 3rd generation mobile or fixed wireless technology and utilise Universal Service Funds to distribute broadband to rural and under served areas.
