Title: Tools of the Trade
Author: Saurin Nanavati
Source: AGCommons
Publisher: AGCommons
Date (published): September 2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: blog post
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
A collaboration between the Grameen Foundation, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Uganda’s National Agriculture Research Organization (NARO), MTN Public Access Uganda, Agcommons, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has resulted in a tested system for rural development organizations that have effective recommendations for remote farmers, but lack effective mechanisms for presenting them directly to rural communities and monitoring the uptake.

The system developed addresses this missing link by demonstrating how training a specialized corps of community–based information officers known as Community Knowledge Workers (or CKWs) in combination with a mobile-phone based geographic information system (GIS) can provide improved coordination between planning and field activities -- in order to more efficiently and effectively gather on-farm information, visually track extension activities, measure extension officers’ performance and more accurately monitor impact of extension activities on local agriculture production.

Title: ICT4D Wiki
Author: Ismael Peña-López
Source: ICTlogy
Publisher: ICTlogy
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: wiki
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
Compilation of all sorts of information in ICT4D.

Title: Uruguay's Plan Ceibal: The world's most ambitious roll-out of educational technologies?
Author: Michael Trucano
Source: EduTech
Publisher: The World Bank Group
Date (published): 18/09/2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: blog post
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML and video)
Abstract:
Plan Ceibal, the education reform initiative that is aiming (most famously) to provide one laptop for every student and teacher in Uruguay, is set, according to project director Miguel Brechner, to achieve 'full deployment' at the primary level by the end of this month, and is now targeting secondary education as well. Brechner's very informative presentation provided insight into the context, scale and ambition behind the initiative, and included some very intriguing preliminary results.

Title: Capital, Power, and the Next Step in Decentralization
Author: Yochai Benkler
Source: Publius Project
Publisher: Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University
Date (published): 16/09/2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: essay
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
As we think of ICTs for development, we must understand that the challenge is a focus on widespread distribution of high-capacity devices, in the hands of a highly skilled population, over open networks running simple and non-proprietary standards. Devices must be cheap enough to be widely distributed as basic background features, owned by individuals in a pattern uncorrelated with pre-existing power relations. Devices must be accompanied with skills training in the use of the device and the open network, so that the difficulty of use does not continue to drive people to the simpler devices that deliver the more predictable, controlled, and “safe” applications. In the near future, this may mean programs focused on women, much as micro-lending has been, or youths and children. In the longer term, it must mean an emphasis on cheap computers from the lineage of the personal computer, not souped-up mobile phones. Or, in the alternative, it means that we need a heavier focus on regulatory interventions that will require mobile phones and phone networks to be more open and flexible—although this is a harder row to hoe. And in all events it means devices coupled with training.

Title: A Response to "A Dialogue on ICTs, Human Development, Growth and Poverty Reduction"
Author: Onno Purbo
Source: Publius Project
Publisher: Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University
Date (published): 21/09/2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: essay
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
Unfortunately, in practice in the grassroots, a knowledge-based society is not about the concepts or terms “universal access”, “openness”, and “innovation”. It is more about *how* to create a movement within the society / community to get universal access, to embed openness in a culture, to help innovation flourish among the 240 million Indonesians. Unlike most western countries, we Indonesians cannot rely on the government too heavily. Create a self-financed, sustainable, self-propelled movement within such large number of people with minimal support from the government is an art in itself.

Title: Broadening the Agenda for ICT for Poverty Reduction
Author: Ophelia Mascarenhas
Source: Publius Project
Publisher: Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University
Date (published): 21/09/2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: essay
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
Six years down the line the debate still continues. In the developing countries the explosive increase in the use of ICTs has not been matched with a tremendous decline in poverty or socio-economic inequalities. Have financial resources for the BOP been lured and diverted to mobiles instead of other needs? Could the outflow of capital directly in terms of airtime tariffs and purchases of equipment and indirectly through the construction of massive billboards, TV slots and promotional campaigns been better used to reduce poverty?

Title: Reflecting on Social and Gender Injustice In The Context of Human Development, Poverty and ICTs
Author: Ineke Buskens
Source: Publius Project
Publisher: Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University
Date (published): 17/09/2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: essay
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
In concerning ourselves about the role of ICTs for human development and poverty reduction, we take a position grounded in a sense of social justice, and we look through the lens of human agency at the economic potential of ICTs.

The concept of human development is grounded in social justice. A commitment to social justice in a gendered world means commitment to the practical application of gender justice. Social and gender issues are inextricably intertwined, yet gender justice is an end in itself. Women have the right to experience their being-ness for themselves, to perceive themselves as the most important reason for their own existence, and not to be defined mainly by what they mean to others: husbands, children and parents.
...
I thus want to tell a story that was one of the case studies in the GRACE Africa Research Network’s First Phase, contextualize it with insights gained within the wider research quest in which this particular research took place (Buskens & Webb), and respond to it from my own theoretical, methodological and normative positions. This allows me to speak to the relationship between ICTs, human development and poverty reduction, while becoming transparent as a “constructor of knowledge”.

Title: The Poverty of Policy and Practice
Author: Alison Gillwald
Source: Publius Project
Publisher: Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University
Date (published): 21/09/2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: essay
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
For the last five years since Harvard I, Research ICT Africa (RIA) has been systematically collecting current supply side ICT indicators, and developing the only systematic demand side ICT indicators, in 18 countries across the continent in order to understand policy reform on the continent. So, we can affirm one of the primary narratives in the bundle prepared for the second Harvard Forum with evidence of the dramatic changes mobile communications have brought to in Africa. With average teledensities in sub-Saharan Africa of less than 1% 10 years ago, the much acclaimed fastest growth rate in the world has allowed millions of Africans now to own their own communications devices and can accessservices for the first time. In several countries, mobile penetration is beginning to transcend the 40% critical mass [2] identified as necessary to enjoy the network effects that realise economic growth and development-producing innovations such as mobile banking and employment or agricultural information services.

Has this contributed significantly to poverty alleviation on the continent? Certainly not significantly; marginally, perhaps. What can be said for certain is that ICT is certainly not being optimised on the continent for developmental gains.

Title: Access Beyond Developmentalism: Technology and the Intellectual Life of the Poor
Author: Lawrence Liang
Source: Publius Project
Publisher: Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University
Date (published): 21/09/2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: essay
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
n this brief note I would like to raise a few critical questions about the dominant ICT and Development discourse that dominates policy and NGO circles, and I will be using the writings of Ranciere, the CM practitioners, and the conversation between them as the grounds on which to raise these questions. Ranciere began his career as a labour historian, and had initially set out to do a straight forward history of class consciousness in the labour archives outside Paris. What he found surprised him, and informed his philosophy of education and I believe has immense significance for people working on ICT, poverty and development. Ranciere’s rethinking of labour history paves the way for us to start thinking seriously about the hidden domain of aspiration and desire of the subaltern subject, while at the same time thinking about the politics of our own aspirations and desires.

Title: A Response to "A Dialogue on ICTs, Human Development, Growth and Poverty Reduction"
Author: Rohan Samarajiva
Source: Publius Project
Publisher: Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University
Date (published): 17/09/2009
Date (accessed): 28/09/2009
Type of information: essay
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
What has changed since 2003?

Many things, but the most significant in terms of developing countries is the transformation of the role and position of mobile networks and services.

The industry dynamics around the mobile have changed with mobile equipment manufacturers (network and handset) and mobile operators getting into the telecom industry’s driver’s seat in terms of investment, innovation and thought leadership, and new actors such as Google and Apple making their presence felt in the mobile space. Network technology has changed, with the momentum, in terms of how people will access the functionalities currently associated with the Internet, shifting to EDGE and HSPA/HSDPA networks and away from ADSL and other wireguided media and WiMAX in many developing-country markets. There appears to be a powerful trend of convergence whereby mobile handsets are becoming smarter and easier to use on one side and laptops are becoming more like handsets (e.g., netbooks with embedded SIM cards) on the other.