Hear her talk about how she came to using ICTs, her criticism about ICT4D not considering the people with all their aspects - especially missing out in social terms. Also she talks about the activities of APC and the need to put pressure and regulation on the private IT sector and the industry to ensure positive outcomes for development.
This post is part of a series of interviews collected at this years conference Coop 2.0 in Gijon.
Alexander Widmer works for Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and has been Deputy Head of the Information and Communications Technologies for Development (ICT4D) Division until it was closed down in 2008. Now he is responsible for the efficient use of ICTs in the newly created Knowledge and Learning Processes Division.
Hear him talk about the efforts of SDC in the follow up of the World Information Summits in 2003 and 2005, their present activities - which focus more on traditional development assistance - and his views on the potentials of ICTs.
This post is part of a series of interviews collected at this years conference Coop 2.0 in Gijon.
Jan Blom works at Nokia Research in Bangalore, India and formerly helped to build up Nokia Design Studio there. He is leading a team of nomadic researchers which try to understand the ways users use their mobile devices.
Hear him talk about his personal background of social sciences and HCI and his work at Nokia Design Studio.
This post is part of a series of interviews collected at this years conference Coop 2.0 in Gijon.
Vikas Nath is working with the South Centre - an intergovernmental organization of developing countries founded in 1995. It has 50 member countries and represents the interests of these countries on the international stage. Topics the South Centre works on include trade, intellectual rights or climate change.
Hear him talk about projects his work group is involved in and the three step (immersion, design, evaluation) system of innovation for finding ICT4D solutions to problems in less developed countries.
This post is part of a series of interviews collected at this years conference Coop 2.0 in Gijon.
Ismael Peña-López is lecturer at the Open University of Catalonia and an important contributor to the ICT4D scene. On his blog ICTlogy he publishes his own research and covers conferences and events he attends.
Personally speaking he influenced me very much in writing my thesis and it’s always enjoyable to read through his posts. We also met several times at events and are currently collaborating on an ICT4D calendar project.
In the video you can hear him talking about his two lives concerning ICT4D and his PdH thesis dealing with e-Readiness.
In the interview he expresses his personal views on the potentials of ICT in development and states that in his opinion ICTs are one of the most powerful tools in the last 2000 years.
He has been working in the World Bank for a while and always promoted the usage of ICTs - both internal and external - right now with a series of workshops and seminars with international stakeholders, both from public and private sector.
Make sure to watch the video - a strong call for new and innovative approaches towards development.
Now that Cooperation 2.0 in Gijon is over for already a week, we would like to share some thoughts and impressions from the event.
The overall guiding theme of Coop 2.0 was “Innovation on ICT for Development Cooperation” and this theme was present in almost every talk and round table. Already in the entry speech of Nadjat Rochdi from UNDP, the need for innovation was accentuated. And adverse to invention (having new ideas) she defindes innovation as “appyling ideas in a new way“. Furthermore she called for collective action of all stakeholders - governments, NGOs, private sector.
The projects and organizations presented in the following days mostly conformed to these ideas, showing interessting concepts on how to use existing technology for social and economic improvement, or how to reshape development cooperation to let everybody contribute.
What these three presentations showed was that the right technology in the right situation has huge potential. But, as Kentaro Toayama pointed out - not for every problem, there is a technological solution which makes sense. Stéphane Boyera presented mobile phones as the most powerful device in ICT4D currently - changing lifestyles of people all around the world and empowering the poor to act as contibutors instead only as consumers. But he also mentioned the shortcomings of mobile phones and the need for an inclusive approach, integrating other technology already in place.
On the “reshaping development cooperation” side there were for example
The statements in these presentations were supporting an increased integration of the southern countries in the process of bridging the digital divide. Furthermore the need for urgent cooperative actions was underlined. As Vikas Nath put it - networked cooperation is a must - institutions have to learn to integrate themselves in bigger networks.
In the discussion panels it was often claimed that in ICT4D, development needs to be in focus, not technology - but in my opinion most contributors at Coop 2.0 seemed to have understood that. What they shared was the enthusiasm about ICTs - as Oleg Petrov put it - one of the most powerful tools in human history.
Coop 2.0 was therefore in my understanding a highly valuable event for the international ICT4D and general development cooperation community to meet, network and share experiences and best practices. It was inspiring to hear of innovative projects using ICTs on the one hand, but also of attempts to achieve increased networking in development cooperation - where ICTs naturally can contribute substantially.
RSS feed
