Fellow GKD Members,
It has been a while since I posted to the GKD forum. Between then and now,
a lot has taken place at the front of harnessing information and knowledge
for development. Perhaps the most significant is the pronouncement of the
world community leaders to reduce poverty levels to half by the year 2015,
and the corresponding trumpet phrase of "attacking poverty" enunciated in
the latest World Development Report. The following is a reflection of my
thoughts on this pledge in light of the precarious conditions of the poor,
and past attempts to address the issues at the root of world poverty.
Some critical questions come to mind in this respect: Is this pledge or
promise a kind of social pact or contract with the poor? What are the
visible indicators or criteria by which the poor would recognize that their
conditions have been improved? Are the measuring yardsticks set according
to the needs of the average person, or based on the needs of leaders and
donors? What should ordinary people expect from this promise? Will this
pledge mean anything different from those of past decades of failed
attempts at addressing the issues confronting the poor? Would anyone or
institutions/organizations be held accountable (and by whom) if world
poverty levels deteriorate by the year 2015? Would there be a sense or
feelings of collective guilt if this promise turns out to be hollow in
2015? What kind of knowledge systems which need to be in place to attain
this goal? Would there be a different kind of governance arrangements at
the global, national and local levels reflective of the values and needs of
the poor? Or governance arrangements which treat poverty as a phenomenon to
be addressed as "trickle-down economics" as we have witnessed over the past
decades? What should be the critical role of the much heralded Internet
technology and its associated prospect of distance or distributed learning
for the poor? And what crucial directions should initiatives of harnessing
knowledge for development take in this context?
Assuming that the measuring criteria are based on the real and urgent needs
of the poor (and not on some abstract "growth statistical figures"), then
in Africa, for example, the promise would mean a litany of varied desires
of the poor which lie at the root of poverty on the continent. Among those
directly related to ICTs are:
* Subsistence farmers would have access to information about improved tools
and the means to obtain them so that half of subsistence farmers would no
longer be using hoes and cutlasses to cultivate their fields. Rather, they
would be using some improved form of tillage tools which would lessen the
raw physical energy expended in producing food;
* poor rural and urban populations would have information about nutrition,
health, and hygiene and the means to apply that knowledge so that half of
the rural and urban population would have access to good drinking water,
hygienic sanitation and affordable medical care when sick;
* farmers and schools would have information on the ways to process fruit
so that seasonal fruit that might otherwise rot can be used for school
nutrition programs and the fruit would not remain seasonal and go rotten
but be processed into variety of juices as nutritional beverages for
children and the entire population;
* the Internet would be a tool, among other things, for packaging public
health information and dissemination in the manner that ordinary people
would understand and utilize in their day-to-day affairs;
* degenerating and decaying educational systems would have access to ICTs
that would assist them in being revamped at all levels of learning, and
content, products, and services geared to solving the problems of ordinary
people;
* distance or distributed learning would be skill-based talent acquisition
directed at redressing the idleness and vulnerability of the youthful
population;
* households and businesses would have information about renewable energy
sources and local, natural products and the resources to invest in tapping
solar and related energy for household needs, and harnessing natural
products with care and sense of stewardship;
* households and small companies would have information on improving
products that serve daily needs, e.g., improving the quality of clay and
clay-based products for addressing the housing and household products
demands of ordinary people;
* e-governance initiatives would cultivate governance regimes which command
loyalty, respect, and a sense of belonging of ordinary people borne not out
of fear and repression but voluntary attachments.
To be precise, this litany of desires of the poor is by no means
exhaustive, even for those related to ICTs, and could continue to include
many other interrelated factors and issues which contribute to determine
and shape current poverty levels in Africa and other impoverished
continents. However, it is always important for reflection to focus on the
"fundamentals of human existence".
Since the fateful pronouncement and declaration at the millennium summit,
the poor are yet to know the details of how their desires and needs would
be addressed. It is my belief that they would be interested in knowing if
the attack on poverty to reduce its attendant misery by half would actually
be attack on the root causes or symptoms. And when would the poor feel the
attack on the ground beyond spoken and written words?
The poor have heard promises by their leaders before that they were working
on their behalf to lessen the burden of poverty as those in Ghana and other
parts of Africa were told over the past 20 years or more. But after 20
years, the promise had turned out to be hollow and empty as they were
mainly relegated into sidewalk spectators while the leaders looted and
enriched themselves and their cronies - all in the name of the poor. So the
question now is: Would this latest global millennium social pact or
contract with the poor (if we are allowed to call it a pact or contract)
also turn out to be another "hoax" in the year 2015? If not, then there is
a lot to be done which has not been started yet - and I guess, time and
posterity will be our judge.
Just some thoughts to stimulate discussions and debates on this crucial
global issue of concern to the development community.
Best Regards
Kofi Anani
Consultant, Knowledge Management
World Bank Institute
[EMAIL PROTECTED] / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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