[UgaBYTES] Rural Communication Development Policy-II 2009/14|Draftfor feedback

[Peter Burgess]

Dear Colleagues

As many of you know, the challenges of socio-economic development have
been the center of my professional life for a long time. I have been
encouraged by the emergence of a telecenter infrastructure and
concerned if not discouraged by the ability for these to be
sustainable. From what I see in this conversation, there is a growing
interest in this aspect of the telecenter strategy than before, but
maybe still not enough.

The three main legs of the socio-economic stool might well be health,
education and economic activity (jobs) ... so how does ICT facilitate
these? I would argue that if a local ICT center can bring knowledge
about a community together in a meaningful way ... then it will be
possible for much more collaboration for progress to be mobilized.
This is the intellectual core of the system of Community Analytics
(CA) that has now emerged from my work over the years ... and it seems
natural that the telecenter should be in the middle of collaboration
to deploy this.

You will all know better than I that there are some communities where
progress is good ... and other places where progress is not so good.
What works? What does not? It all depends on the mix of resources,
people, organizations, issues, etc. ... and the best results will be
achieved when all of these are sorted out to work in the best possible
way. Easy to say ... rather more difficult to do ... but results can
be spectacular. I see the telecenter, somehow, as a key piece of
helping to get this to happen.

Sincerely

Peter Burgess
___________
Peter Burgess
Tr-Ac-Net Inc ... The Transparency and Accountability Network
Community Analytics (CA)
Integrated Malaria Management (IMM)
Microfinance Focus Magazine in New York
website: www.tr-ac-net.org
tel: 917 432 1191 or 212 772 6918 or 212 744 6469
email: peterbnyc at gmail.com
skype: peterburgessnyc