ICTlogy

Notes from Asian Telecentre Forum 2009 / eAsia 2009 held in the BMICH, Colombo, Sri Lanka, on December 2-4th, 2009. More notes on this event: easia2009.

New Trends and Innovations in Technology for Telecentres
Chairs: Ram Tiwaree, United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific

Greener and affordable telecentres
Danny Nagdev

The NComputing’s X550 kit connects several periferics (keyboard, mouse, screens) to a single computer.

Advantages of NComputing’s X550 kit: much cheaper than a server-client typical structure, almost all software’s worked, consumes low power, full Screen videos run smoothly, etc.

Limitations: No local USB support

Community empowerment through ICTs: evidences from grassroots in Bangladesh
Ananya Raihan, d.Net

Goal: to understand the linkage between community empowerment and ICTs, but comparing ICT penetration with the level of community empowerment in Bangladesh.

A first problem is that of the evolution and modification of metrics, as ICTs have changed in range and cost, thus changing what we before understood as low level of penetration (e.g. cheap TV sets have drastically replaced radios, which were considered the lowest level of technology adoption of all). On the other hand, is difficult to separate private from collective (a household, a household and their friends/neighbours) from public usage.

Indicator of empowerment:

• Participatory democracy
• Mobilization of community members towards social violence and the role of ICT over it
• Community involvement in the roles and responsibilityes of the local government and the role of ICT over it
• Level of knowledge of the community people about the local, national and international issues and the role of ICTs over it
• Community involvement towards the local governmet annual activity plan and resource mobilization plan
• Transparency and accountability of local government towards the community and the role of ICTs over it
• Presence of collaboration between local government institution and local community organization regarding access to information through ICTs

Findings show that there does not seem to be any linkage amongst ICT penetration and empowerment, though there might be some weak correlation.

Empowering women through ICT education: An application of Gender Evaluation Methodology (GEM)
Fatema Begum Labony, d.Net

A computer literacy project (CLP) with 18,525 students that took a computer course. The school authority would provide infrastructure while d.Net would teach the course.

The study shows the steps to adapt Gender Evaluation Methodology (GEM) by APC. The objective was to understand the extent of equality in acccess to ICTs by girls in the CLP.

Boys have five times more opportunity than girls to learn computer from public places and neighbour as gilrs have less facilities to go and avail it outsiders. Girls are afraid too to used computers.

Parents are also afraid that more “computer time” is less “school time” or, if it’s not, that the daughter has to stay longer time at school (thus, less time to study home, more time out of home, etc.).

Note: on gender evaluation methodology, please see also Gender Evaluation for Social Change.

Previous post: eAsia2009 (VI): Impact of mobile telephony on telecentres

Next post: eAsia2009 (VIII): Building capacity among telecentre operators for sustaining telecentres