[UgaBYTES] AFRICA KOWLEDGE NETWORK launched in Dar es salaam |Strategy

[Ndaula Sulah]

Dearest Kiringai,

Thanks for your contribution... I can see the model "your model" flow as;

 <Data->process->information->synthesize->knowledge->integration->wisdom.

#1. Mirrioring on this model where do you see AKN's intervention?


Pete and others; The regional strategy -December 2008 states the
themes AKN would focus on as; Gender, Agric, Environ. Education,
Health, I.K and appropriate techn. What would be your opinion of the
width of focus against delivering?

FYI: Kiringai all participants of the f2f workshop must be having the
print version of the strategy and other documents that is why they may
not have shared any doc. But I believe Abebe will share the doc. and
provide a link to the group - especially if all the info. is public
digest.

Best regards,
---
Sulah



On 7/14/09, Ndaula Sulah <ndaulasula at ugabytes.org> wrote:
> Dear All,
>
> What a great contribution from Pete - he brings to AKN his lessons of
> the past as a leader at OKN (UK). I didn't expect any less from his
> contribution.
>
> How points out pitfalls at;
>
> #1. Intended impact "Transform into knowledge hub" and it's measurability
> #2. Target groups (intended users and content aggregators)
>
> But on the positive end he joins earlier voice to note
>
> #1. Despite greater successes and lessons of different telecentre
> interventions there is no shortage of work that still needs to be done
> to increase impact.
> #2. He will dig reports on the lessons of OKN and shares them to the
> benefit of AKN
>
> Additionally, Pete points out areas that need keen improvement;
>
> #1. AKN idea thinking and presentation - using hubs is a great mind
> but given the global focus of the project, it will like trying to
> localize international knowledge which can not work for community
> targeted initiatives [save for specialists]
> #2. The strategy's relationship with; content vs knowledge, local vs
> global knowledge, target users vs target compilers and result vs
> process
>
>
> The biggest challenge he points out is that of localizing global
> information and knowledge especially if the project is targeting
> community and if it doesn't intend to do it through intermediaries.
> And indeed it was the weak end of OKN.
>
>
> Unanswered questions ----
>
> #1. Whose knowledge
> #2.  Are they information hubs or knowledge hubs
> #3. but either way how will knowledge be packaged; or can knowledge be
> packaged
>
>
> I guess friends at UNECA and members of the list would love to give
> some feed back and questions to Pete's issues - Abebe...
>
> Best regards,
> ---
> Sulah
>
>
>
> On 7/13/09, Meddie Mayanja <mmayanja at idrc.ca> wrote:
>> I am trying to get to speed on this initiative. It has not been easy since
>> I
>> am just recovering from poor health - lots to catchup with.
>>
>> Pete: provides a great analysis especially linking what we we have
>> learned
>> in the past from similar initiatives. I am sure the programming team will
>> take a close look at these issues raised here - if not done already.
>>
>> Understanding the target group and when one can confirm ICT centres have
>> been turned into knowledge hubs are key data points for me too.
>>
>> Best, Meddie
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> ________________________________________
>> From: ugabytes-bounces at lists.ugabytes.org
>> [ugabytes-bounces at lists.ugabytes.org] On Behalf Of Pete Cranston
>> [pete.cranston at btinternet.com]
>> Sent: July 13, 2009 5:58 AM
>> To: ugabytes at lists.ugabytes.org
>> Subject: Re: [UgaBYTES] AFRICA KOWLEDGE NETWORK launched in Dar es salaam
>>    |Strategy
>>
>> Hi
>>
>> Thanks everyone for this rich and interesting exchange. I have been
>> reading
>> the Project Document and want to comment for two reasons:
>>
>> 1. Learning: people have suggested AKN could benfit from the learning
>> from
>> our experience with OKN that could be useful. I have promised to dig out
>> learning reports, which I will do. Some of our work on content for
>> telecentre.org might also be useful. Specifically here I try and share
>> some
>> learning about global vs. local
>>
>> 2. Local Content: as I announced on this list some time ago Peter
>> Ballantyne
>> and I are doing some research into what is happening with Local Content
>> in
>> Eastern (and, to some extent Southern) Africa since we both worked in the
>> area with OKN, IICD and telecentre.org. We are planning a small workshop
>> later this year, probably in Brussels in October, to try and bring
>> together
>> people working in the area, international NGOs and funders to discuss how
>> to
>> promote and extend the work since it is still a crucial part of
>> development.
>> I am contacting people who have replied to our first call about how we
>> can
>> organise that workshop and who is interested in taking the work further.
>> We
>> are sharing information using the low bandwidth blogging platform, Maneno
>> -
>> http://communitycontent.maneno.org. It is about content that I have some
>> questions.
>>
>> First, though, I hope the programme is a success. Any new investment in
>> the
>> ICT4D in general and telecentres in particular has to be a good thing and
>> $1m isn't a small amount of money, even spread across the ECA, ECE,
>> ECLAC,
>> and ESCAP region over three years. From the names that I recognise at the
>> Africa planning meeting I think there is as much wisdom within that group
>> about these issues as in any other group on the planet. Certainly there
>> is
>> little I could add to that collection of brains and experience, a great
>> resource for the project managers. It's true that a lot of the language
>> of
>> the project seems very familiar from similar projects over the years, but
>> then the world hasn't changed all that much either: people face the same
>> problems - in some cases worse - and although projects like
>> telecentre.org
>> have done wonderful work there is no shortage of work that still needs to
>> be
>> done. I've cooked lots of meals for my family but I still learn from new
>> recipes.
>>
>> Personally, I found it hard to understand what the project document is
>> saying about content and knowledge management. 'Knowledge' is in
>> headlines,
>> but how people in communities will get involved in learning new things,
>> or
>> in sharing what they know isn't exactly clear. One of the core building
>> blocks in the problem tree says, "Low capabilities of disadvantaged
>> communities in accessing, adapting and utilizing knowledge". It doesn't
>> specify whose knowledge is being talked about but a lot of the language,
>> as
>> Polly says, is about global knowledge networking which was *by far* the
>> least successful part of OKN.
>>
>> MOre promisingly the document says, " Knowledge hubs will act as
>> intermediary stations between the local communities and the global
>> knowledge
>> networks. Knowledge hubs will be localizing knowledge gained from peer
>> ICT
>> access points, including those in other regions fitting the specificity
>> of
>> the localities they are serving, while they will also contribute to
>> creating
>> knowledge by providing experiences gained from the local community to the
>> benefit of the global networks at large."
>>
>> But then, " The project is mainly concerned with identifying and
>> implementing solutions that aggregate fragmented knowledge that is useful
>> to
>> different disadvantaged  communities, and providing solutions that
>> increase
>> utilization of this aggregated knowledge." As Polly says, we found that
>> external knowledge, especially from other parts of the globe, or even
>> region
>> - doesn't translate easily - in terms of language, format, context and
>> relevance - to specific communities.  The document suggests there is a "a
>> common (global) pool of knowledge for each priority area" but our
>> experience
>> was this may be true at a specialist level - doctors and nurses,
>> academics
>> and agricultural specialist, physics teachers - but not at a village, or
>> community level. Is this a network to connect specialists, who can be
>> intermediaries? That would be useful, but it's not clear to me if that is
>> the target group since 'communities' are mentioned a lot.
>>
>> A problem is for me that the process relating to knowledge, content and
>> learning is simply captured in an arrow called, "Transformation Process".
>> A
>> possible source of the confusion is that the document sometimes treats
>> knowledge as if it is something that can be packaged and shared like
>> pictures or music. This was one of our *fundamental errrors* in OKN (by
>> 'our' I mean the global team, not the people in African partner
>> organisations). In fact our experience reinforced what we should have
>> remembered, that learning is a social process. Making information
>> accessible
>> is only the first step in that process. Further, in terms of knowledge
>> transfer - which to me means learning - from outside a community, a
>> trusted
>> intermediary is vital. Our resources were spread too thin - we were also
>> a
>> project that was sold as global - to focus enough on this area.
>>
>> It has been very interesting to talk again to Peter Balaba in Nakeseke
>> and
>> Joseph Sekiku in FADECO about the way that they, like many others, use
>> all
>> their media channels (radio, internet, print) to circulate local
>> knowledge
>> through their community audiences. It is that process of engaging with
>> people, capturing what they know and do, sharing that with people who are
>> close enough to trust the sources - and sometimes passing on to the
>> outside
>> especially useful ideas  - that I think is at the core of learning and
>> knowledge. But it is an expensive, long-term, people-based process so
>> hard
>> to persuade funders to resource and even harder to finance through
>> business
>> models built on providing information and entertainment services to
>> paying
>> customers.
>>
>> I think it's an ambitious project which raises some questions, especially
>> the AKN aim of "Transforming selected ICT access points into knowledge
>> hubs
>> of the global knowledge platform, providing, developing, organizing,
>> sharing
>> and disseminating knowledge pertinent to these communities". and
>> especially
>> what will be measured in the indicator, "Number of transformed ICT access
>> points into knowledge hubs" at evaluation time. I'd love to learn more:
>>
>> * What does the team understand by knowledge, and what role do they see
>> for
>> local content?
>> * Will the project support the people-based social processes that make up
>> knowledge transfer, or learning, and if so how?
>> * How will the project identify the point at which an access point becomes
>> a
>> knowledge hub? Will it be through having physical and electronic
>> resources
>> in place - which a lot of places already have - or will it be more
>> ambitious
>> and try to assess how effectively the hub supports the learning processes
>> -
>> and if so, how?
>> * Finally, who is the project targetting?
>>
>> I think the proposal confirms, if it still needed confirming, that shared
>> access to digital resources through telecentres of one kind or another is
>> seen as a key tool in development. I wish everyone in the project all the
>> luck in the world and look forward to learning from your experiences.
>>
>> Best wishes
>>
>> Pete
>>
>>
>> Pete Cranston
>> skype: petecranston
>> mobile: +44 (0)7917 390133
>>
>>
>>
>> Pete Cranston
>> skype: petecranston
>> mobile: +44 (0)7917 390133
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: ugabytes-bounces at lists.ugabytes.org
>> [mailto:ugabytes-bounces at lists.ugabytes.org] On Behalf Of NKURUNZIZA Jean
>> Paul
>> Sent: 10 July 2009 11:26
>> To: ugabytes at lists.ugabytes.org
>> Subject: Re: [UgaBYTES] AFRICA KOWLEDGE NETWORK launched in Dar es salaam
>> |Strategy
>>
>> Hello all !
>> The discussions going on about the AKN is really interesting !
>> My suggestion is that online discussion throught a mailing list is
>> conducted
>> before physical meetings for next events related to AKN.
>>
>> I just want to emphasize on one aspect of the project strategy  :"
>> Avoiding overlap and duplication". I can read this statement on the point
>> 6 entitled :" Implementing the Regional Knowledge Network", in the second
>> subpoint entitled : "6.2. Partnerships". This is found in the draft of
>> the
>> regional strategy document.
>>
>> So yes, this  project from UNECA will learn from other simular projects,
>> and
>> will partner with other organizations involved in the same area.
>> I even remember that one participant raised the OKN experience to be
>> taken
>> into consideration in addition to others like telecentre.org.
>>
>> I hope final documents will be shared soon by the UNECA team .
>> Meanwhile, there I can see there is an interesting document about the
>> projecton this link :
>> http://knowledgenets.net/images/Documents/project%20document.pdf
>>
>> Sincerely
>>
>>> Hi Sulah,
>>> Just a mixer of Rosaline SATNET Zimbabwe. It should read SATNET, Zambia.
>>> Rosaline comes from SAFIRE, Zimbabwe,
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>>
>>>
>>> Dean Mulozi,
>>> ZAA-ICT/SATNET Regional Facilitator,
>>> Private Bag 195x Ridgeway,
>>> Lusaka,
>>> Zambia.
>>>
>>> Mobile:                  260 978 034196
>>>
>>>
>>> --- On Thu, 7/9/09, Polly Gaster <polly.gaster at uem.mz> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> From: Polly Gaster <polly.gaster at uem.mz>
>>> Subject: Re: [UgaBYTES] AFRICA KOWLEDGE NETWORK launched in Dar es
>>> salaam
>>> |Strategy
>>> To: ugabytes at lists.ugabytes.org
>>> Date: Thursday, July 9, 2009, 4:58 AM
>>>
>>>
>>> Dear Paul
>>>
>>> Thanks for the info. And Sulah also helped to clarify some questions.
>>>
>>> Just one clarification from my point of view - my initial fear was
>>> that in the first place this new project would NOT reap important
>>> lessons from previous experiences such as OKN, which is already closed
>>> down as an international project but left some seeds behind, as
>>> Gladman knows. And not a fear of "competition" as such but yes, a
>>> concern about possible failure to benefit from and collaborate with
>>> and strengthen what little already exists on the ground. I have seen
>>> this very often, as Kiringai mentioned - too often institutions want
>>> their own "branding" and visibility in preference to synergies, and
>>> doing things in parallel (duplicating) means higher costs, and creates
>>> confusion at local level, where (in Mozambique at least) the human
>>> resources are not so many and it tends to be the same people doing
>>> everything anyway. Hence my initial short question, which has provoked
>>> such an interesting exchange of views.
>>>
>>> But in general, of course, the more things that are happening the
>>> better, and any organisation should feel free to work directly with
>>> any community initiative on the ground so long as it is bringing
>>> strength in some way and not exploiting. I don't think anyone who has
>>> commented so far has been worried about duplicating networks as such,
>>> which will live or die according to how useful they are, it's the
>>> local impact that matters.
>>>
>>> I guess the general concern emerging from the list is precisely
>>> wanting to be sure that the AKN has been thought through and has
>>> learned from so much that has already been done or attempted in this
>>> area. I find that institutions, even governments, when something isn't
>>> working often just abandon it and set up something else, without ever
>>> sitting down and learning the hard lessons.
>>>
>>>>From our own small OKN experience I wd point out 3 things:
>>> a) we used existing telecentres/CMCs/community radios as a base for
>>> OKN activities rather than setting up something separate, hoping that
>>> this strategy wd be mutually beneficial and good for the community,
>>> which I think it was. And also gave a better chance of sustainability,
>>> and continuation "post-project".
>>> b) the language issue drastically reduced the possibilities of sharing
>>> locally produced content - in our case not only the fact of having
>>> many national languages, but even our official language of Portuguese
>>> doesn't exactly help!
>>> c) we found on a study visit to India, as well as experiences with
>>> Latin America, that it's impossible to generalise strategies from
>>> continent to continent, as the contexts are so very different.
>>>
>>> Hope this is a helpful contribution. But I would still like the AKN
>>> strategy to be shared more widely, to see if there is anything that we
>>> can learn or benefit from. I am always curious!
>>>
>>> Polly
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ----
>>>
>>> Polly Gaster
>>> TICs para Desenvolvimento/ICT4D
>>> Centro de Informatica da Universidade Eduardo Mondlane (CIUEM) Campus
>>> Universitario, Maputo, Mozambique
>>> e-mail: polly.gaster at uem.mz
>>> cel:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> ugabytes mailing list
>>> ugabytes at lists.ugabytes.org
>>> http://lists.ugabytes.org/mailman/listinfo/ugabytes_lists.ugabytes.org
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> NKURUNZIZA Jean Paul
>> Président du Réseau des Télécentres Communautaires  du Burundi Secrétaire
>> Général de BYTC B.P 7031 BUJUMBURA BURUNDI
>> Tél: 00257 22 21 96 45
>> Tél Mob : 00257 76 60 49 46/00257 79 981 459 Fax : 00257 212485 ou 00257
>> 222147 E.Mail : nkurunziza at bytc.bi ou
>>          jnkurunz at hotmail.com
>> Site web : http://www.bytc.bi
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> ugabytes mailing list
>> ugabytes at lists.ugabytes.org
>> http://lists.ugabytes.org/mailman/listinfo/ugabytes_lists.ugabytes.org
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> ugabytes mailing list
>> ugabytes at lists.ugabytes.org
>> http://lists.ugabytes.org/mailman/listinfo/ugabytes_lists.ugabytes.org
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> ugabytes mailing list
>> ugabytes at lists.ugabytes.org
>> http://lists.ugabytes.org/mailman/listinfo/ugabytes_lists.ugabytes.org
>>
>
>
> --
> Executive Director
> UgaBYTES Initiative
> Tel: +256414370163
> Mob: +256712314969
> Skype: sulah.ndaula
> Yahoo: ndaulasula
> Email: ndaulasula@
> (ugabytes.org,yahoo.co.uk or gmail)
>


-- 
Executive Director
UgaBYTES Initiative
Tel: +256414370163
Mob: +256712314969
Skype: sulah.ndaula
Yahoo: ndaulasula
Email: ndaulasula@
(ugabytes.org,yahoo.co.uk or gmail)