Info-tech programmes to focus on poverty alleviation The News International Saturday June 30, 2001 http://jang.com.pk ISLAMABAD: The Information Technology Division has been undergoing an exercise of prioritizing those programmes which can contribute to poverty alleviation efforts in the country. Sources said that priority is being given to job-specific and need-oriented programmes and those programme will be focussed which can greatly contribute to poverty alleviation in the country. In this regard, Minister for Science and Technology Professor Atta-ur-Rehman has set up a subcommittee to come forward with new programmes based on national needs which have the potential to make maximum impact on society. The committee will submit its recommendations after making a survey of existing situation, further requirements in the field and after taking input from other related persons and organisations. As a result of human resource development programmes launched by the ministry in the year 2000-2001 supply side has been considerably strengthened, sources said and added that the required infrastructure is also in place. Now Pakistani companies are in a much better position to accomplish big foreign contracts. The civil society organisations are also showing interest in the area of IT and access of rural and poor community to it. An NGO with the name of E-Poor (Electronic Poor) has begun its work and was looking into various aspects like digital divide and demand side of the information technology and its applications. To realise the promises of IT for an equitable socio-economic growth for poverty alleviation and opportunity generation, it is required to balance and work on the demand side of IT needs, said an expert at E-Poor. It is interesting to note that sometimes the way development information portals categorise and classify information is not the way poor need, discuss, process and access information. What can be a very relevant suggestion here is to include the participatory role of community "key informants." These key informants are perceived as reliable source of verbal information at the community levels and their potentials can be harnessed for community Information Points (IT kiosks), said Zubair Faisal Abbassi, project director of ePoor.org. -APP ------------ ***GKD is an initiative of the Global Knowledge Partnership*** To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at: <http://www.globalknowledge.org>
