Appropriate policies necessary to build Information Society

By Aloyce Menda of JUSTA-AFRICA

Prominent scholars like sociologist Manuel Castells of The Network Society, predicts that the social implication of the current information revolution will be as profound as those of the agricultural revolution and the later industrial revolution of the 19th Century.

"Where is the money for bridging the digital divide and building Information Society?" “How do we acquire the expertise to develop infrastructure and install the necessary Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)?”

These are questions asked often by many people in developing countries whenever informed about the benefits of applying ICT in their daily activities, says Harry Hare, the east African manager of the African Information Technology Exhibitions and Conferences (AITEC). While stakeholders in the ICT sectors are probing hard for solutions, policy architects at local and international level are facing tough challenges and dilemmas in transforming the intellectual attitudes of bureaucrats and hard-line politicians toward modernization and sustainable development.

Head of States and the top government bureaucrats would like to question policy proposals, why the format of annual national budgets should be rectified to allocate more money for introducing ICT lessons in schools, while some schools lack essential facilities such as electricity, telephone and enough desks.

In Tanzania for instance, it was only after foreign donors’ pressure and promise to support that the Ministry of Education and Culture (MoEC) accepted, and started implementation of a strategy to introduce ICT as a compulsory subject and teaching aid in all secondary schools. ICT training in teachers’ colleges started after Agreement signing on May 17, 2005 between the Swedish Embassy in Dar es Salaam and MoEC. In the Agreement, the Swedish International Agency for Development Aid (SIDA) pledged to grant Tshs. four billion (approx. US$ four million) in support of the project.

Nevertheless, some bureaucratic officials are asking: “What is the future benefit of ICT training in Tanzanian schools whilst most of students’ guardians are peasant farmers who still use the archaic hand-tools that do not enable them to produce beyond subsistence level?” “Can ICT knowledge alleviate rural poverty?” Covering 937,062 square kilometers of country size, Tanzania has a huge potential for agriculture with an estimated 43 million hectares suitable for farming. However, only an average of 6.3 million hectares are cultivated annually mostly by peasant farmers. Yet, about 80 % of the Tanzanian population of 3.4 million is rural and relies on agriculture for livelihood.

Deemed as the spine of the economy since independence from Britain in 1961, the agricultural sector is poorly performing and its current contribution to GDP is only 50 % though it employs over 70 % of national labour force. According to government statistics, an overall real agricultural GDP has been growing at an average rate of only about 3.5 % per annum since 1981.

In Tanzania like most developing countries, a policy proposal often faces criticisms based on prioritization challenges. Should the meager state resources go in education, ICT training in particular, or in modernizing the ailing agricultural sector to alleviate extensive rural poverty? Even authorities in the higher learning institutions find it hard to influence bureaucrats and source government funds, says Charles Senkondo; the director of the Dar es Salaam based Tanzania Global Development Learning Center (TGDLC). The center is a government project funded by the World Bank and it offers training courses through distant learning programs.

The National ICT Policy of Tanzania released in March 2003 passed prioritization challenges as well but has yet to address some criticisms. “What are the future benefits of ICT in the impoverished rural Tanzania?” and “Where would the money for bridging the digital-divide come from?”

In 2001, Tanzania was listed among nine technological marginalized countries in the UNDP’s Technology Achievement Index. According to the National ICT Policy, most of ICT services are limited to urban areas due to the lack of telecommunication networks and electricity in most rural areas. An official record indicates that by 2002, Tanzania had a low tele-density, at 12 telephone lines per 1,000 people for the fixed and mobile cellular lines. The mobile phone subscribers were 81 per 10,000 people. Dar es Salaam, the de-facto capital, had five fixed lines and 10 mobile phone subscribers per 100 people.

The fragile Information Society in Tanzania faces the problem of low capacity and costly Internet connectivity. Today the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) has licensed less than a dozen companies to provide public data communication services including Internet bandwidth. According to the National ICT Policy, these data operators have isolated initiatives of connecting their Points-of-Presence (PoPs) to the global Internet backbone. As a result, Tanzania lacks cheaper and high capacity connections to the global Internet. “All connections, regardless of data service provider are small capacity international links that connect to the global Internet back-bone in different countries such as Norway and the United States,” says the policy.

As Globalization broadens, a global knowledge and information society is emerging, across all nations including Tanzania. Today knowledge and information are significant factors for production and services and attain ever more value. They affect the international division of labor, determine the competitiveness of economies and corporations, breed new growth patterns and in the process generate new products, jobs and livelihoods.

ICT propel these processes, cut across all sectors and impact on virtually all human and societal activities. ICT infrastructures are a conveyer belt for sources that generate, access, disseminate and share knowledge, data, information, communications and best practices worldwide. Globally, the potentials and undeniably impact of modern ICT are widely felt. They can foster and facilitate sustainable development, assist in the fight against poverty and strengthen informed and participatory decision-making and governance at all levels.
Modern ICT have additional fascinating feature: they can empower the technologically poor societies to “leapfrog” across several generations and stages of technology, towards sustainable development. Previously, such a process took centuries. ICT are therefore a cost-effective and efficient option that could help all societies attain the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) set by the United Nations.
Harnessing resources for ICT projects
Currently, foreign donors are funding most of ICT projects in developing countries. Nevertheless, the key challenge remains unsolved: “Where are the local resources for bridging the digital-divide and building Information Society in developing countries?”

Some stakeholders in the ICT sectors think local resources are currently not available hence the developed countries should increase development assistance to developing countries. On the contrary there are stakeholders who think otherwise. These think local resources are available but policy changes are necessary to diverge the resources towards adoption of ICT in all economic sectors. They believe ICT appliance would eventually empower poor communities to enable them generate resources locally for bridging the digital-divide.

These contradictory opinions are more or less like the ancient “chicken and egg” debate. What should be the initial strategy in searching funds? While the debate is going on, the annoying fact is; the official development aid from industrialized countries is not reliable and often not timely. Bonded with that fact is the inevitable real

Posted By: ALOYCE MENDA