By NKURUNZIZA Jean Paul

BCTN, under the support from CTA held the strategic plan workshop. It was at “Centre Communautaire de Bujumbura” from 25 to 27th January 2010. The workshop was also an opportunity for us to advertise the existence of B.C.T.N in Burundi.

By Francis Mwathi

telecentre.org Foundation moved to its new home base in Manila, Philippines. This was in line with the foundation’s big plans to continue its mandate of increasing the impact of grassroots telecentres on social and economic development in communities around the world.

The arrival of the fibre optic into East Africa was feted as a definite ingredient that would spur more use of ICT and therefore catalyze the development process.
In Kenya, all people who mattered from politicians, to telecommunication managers and engineers were full of praise for this development.
What with an apparent increase in quality of connectivity in terms of speed as well as what was touted as a definite decrease in connectivity costs.

Climate Change is a big challenge to development interventions at the moment yet it becomes a major global agenda and conferences after conference are being organized to find a lasting solution. Communities are finding it hard to predict weather patterns; the rural community that is dependant on subsistence farming continues experiencing loss and decrease in production as a result of the changing weather patterns. There seems to be no hope among the small holder farmers as crops they used to grow no longer does well and traditional varieties of crops are almost facing extinction.

The Government has moved a step closer to online service delivery with the launch of a communication infrastructure. Developed in partnership with Telkom Kenya and Dimension Data, the project is currently on pilot basis.

The online service delivery will see all ministries, and some key Government departments communicate seamlessly. Eventually, the project is expected to see Government function in a paperless framework, and further increase public access to Government information.

Cut costs

A survey shows that Kenya, now experiencing a digital revolution, is in need of not only affordable Internet-enabled mobile phones but also affordable personal computers.

Although the Government continues to invest in technology infrastructure like under sea fibre optic cables and zero-rating mobile phones to enhance connectivity, access to affordable personal computers remains limited. This situation has dimmed benefits that come with connectivity.

By 2012, Kenya would have shifted from analogue to digital broadcasting ahead of the 2015 global deadline.

Experts have , however, warned consumers to be on the look out for crooks, who could flood the market with fake digital products.

But just how do you tell genuine from fake products.

The Africa Knowledge Network (AKN) during the last workshop held in Nairobi Kenya last year, built consensus on the need to change the name from AKN to Knowledge Network of African Community Telecentres (KNACT). This was mainly due to the fact that at a glance the name AKN did not depict any relationship with the telecentre movement and also the need to have a name that in itself could act as an elevator pitch.

The UNECA has been implementing a UN project entitled "knowledge networks through ICT access points for disadvantaged communities" jointly with the United Nations Regional Commissions, with ESCWA as the lead agency, over a period of 36 months starting in 2006. The main goal of the project is to empower poor and disadvantaged communities through the transformation of existing ICT access points in selected countries around the world into knowledge hubs of global knowledge networks.

ECA run a successful workshop on 'knowledge
sharing and networking' last week. You will find the news brief at http://www.uneca.org/eca_programmes/it_for_development/default.htm.
You will also find some of the video clips taken during the workshop on