Pam and Others: You have articulated the challenges. Some rural government people are now aware that ICT can impact development. They want to know more, they are asking for training. But ICT is not a farming tool that you can take to the village and increase farm product yield directly. It is not fertilizer. Urban environments are diffrent, they have well defined manual business processes that we can apply ICT to and improve productivity. What ICT training curriculum do you then introduce to the leadership of, take for example, a tribe of nomads, so that he/she can begin to think of policies that will use IT to improve rural livelihood ?
On 5/16/2005, Pamela McLean wrote: > ...within CawdNet we have expert knowledge of Local Government systems > and needs. One of our chiefs, who now holds a position at state > government level, has a long term concern with tackling the problem of > what he describes as "endemic corruption" in local government. I am > currently exploring training possibilities, on the Chief's behalf, with > a friend of mine who runs courses, in London, on IT in local government > for people from many countries, including Nigeria. ..snip... > You mention "The challenge is to design an ICT training program for the > leadership of the local govenment in a way that exposes them to the > benefits ICT can have on the larger rural community". > > This is an area I would very much like to discuss. One of my main > concerns in designing the CawdNet course is how early we cover certain > aspects of ICTs which potentially introduce considerable conflicts of > interest - issues relating to improved efficiency (possible job losses) > and transparancy for example. Who, amongst LG employees, will welcome > greater efficiency - when it is common knowledge that LG offices are > already overstaffed, unemployment is rife, and there is no social > security system? Who wants transparency, if transparency means loss of > income? ------------ This DOT-COM Discussion is funded by the dot-ORG USAID Cooperative Agreement, and hosted by GKD. http://www.dot-com-alliance.org provides more information. 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 For past messages, see: http://www.dot-com-alliance.org/archive.html
