personal report - ningapi.ning.com/.../ictd2009_dqatar.pdf · 2017-05-28 · personal report 3 rd...

Pascal G. Bekono

PERSONAL REPORT

3RD INTERNATIONAL

CONFERENCE ON ICT

AND DEVELOPMENT

April 17-19, 2009

Doha – Qatar

Pascal Bekono Report ICTD2009

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Thanks to the Organising Committee for the Scholarship

Dr Bernardine Dias, Conference Chair & Pascal Bekono, Conference Attendee


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CONTENTS

I. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................ 3

II. KEYNOTES SPEECHES ............................................................................... 4

Bill Gates, Chairman, Microsoft corporation .................................................................. 4

Carlos A. Primo Braga, World Bank ................................................................................ 6

III. WORKSHOPS & PANELS ............................................................................ 7

Workshops ....................................................................................................................... 7

Panels ............................................................................................................................... 8

IV. SESSIONS ..................................................................................................... 9

V. POSTER & DEMO ....................................................................................... 10

CONCLUSION ................................................................................................... 11

ANNEX ............................................................................................................... 12


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I. INTRODUCTION

The 3rd International Conference on Information Communication Technologies and

Development (ICTD 2009) was held on April, 17-19 2009, in the Carnegie Mellon University

campus of Doha in Qatar. A large number of technology researchers, scholars, practitioners

and social scientists from various countries presented and discussed the latest developments

in the ICT sector.

The organizing committee has selected 19 papers for the oral presentations, 27 full papers for

the poster presentations and two keynote speakers, namely, Bill Gates, Chairman of

Microsoft Corporation and Dr Carlos A. Primo Braga, Director of the Economic Policy

Department at the World Bank.

Many partners assured the success of this event, organized by the TechBridgeWorld research

group at Carnegie Mellon. The Supreme Council of Information & Communication

Technology (ictQATAR) and Al Jazeera Children’s Channel were respectively the organizing

partner and the media partner of the conference. The Qatar National Research Fund, Qatar

Telecom (Qtel) and International Development Research Centre (IDRC) in Canada counted

among the Platinum sponsors, while ExxonMobil and Microsoft were Gold sponsors. IBM and

Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon Qatar were Bronze sponsors. The technical sponsors

for the conference were the IEEE and ACM professional organizations.

This report does not claim to be a complete presentation of what has been said during that

three-day conference, but rather aims at presenting few points about the different phases of

work undertaken throughout that great meeting dealing with recent researches in the field

of ICT and development.


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II. KEYNOTES SPEECHES

BILL GATES, CHAIRMAN, MICROSOFT CORPORATION

In 2008, Bill Gates has received, honorary

doctorate from Harvard, which he left in the

1970ies without ending the curriculum. He is

the author of many books and publications

such as The Road Ahead in 1995 or Business @

the Speed of Thought in 1999.

Bill Gates delivered a lecture titled TWENTY YEARS OF ICT FOR DEVELOPMENT:

APPLYING NEW LESSONS OF THE PAST TO A NEW GENERATION OF

TECHNOLOGY INNOVATIONS

M. Gates expressed his appreciation to countries like Qatar, which are investing in the

future and he said that he was excited to attend this conference and to talk about ICTD.

He described technology as a catalyst of development. Information technology is a helpful

tool for achieving better results in different sectors like health, agriculture or financial

services, and in the educational sector.

Bill Gates pointed out that as technology progressed, the rate of infant mortality decreased

gradually. The figures have been phenomenal. This was due to information and

communication technologies, which had an impact on development in the last 20 years.

However, the benefits did not always come in the way people expected or on the scale they

hoped. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation started to finance some healthy and

educative programs in developing countries with some success. M. Gates dwelt on how much

innovations in technology have reduced the prevalence of many diseases, especially among

children, compared to 50 years ago. But he also added that there were still millions of people

in developing countries, mostly children, who die each year from preventable and curable

diseases. The world must do more to address these problems. Technology is a tool which can

be used to solve the problems of health care globally, especially nowadays, as vaccines and

medicines can defeat many of the world deadliest diseases, and he highlighted that while 80

percent of the vaccines are available worldwide, still millions of people die from diseases

because of the lack of adequate health care. M. Gates hopes that with continuing medical

research, the number of victims from diseases would be cut by half by 2025.

Among the shining achievements of the ICT in the last 20 years, M. Gates named the

developments in the fields of television and personal computers. The Bill and Melinda Gates

Foundation is working with governments in different parts of the world to achieve such

drastic change in infant mortality scenario, he said. Microsoft and the Bill and Melinda

Gates Foundation are involved in numerous ICT projects across the world including

promoting programs which offer ICTD training and affordable access to technology in

developing countries.


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“The Gulf leaders and regional foundations that I have been visiting are doing a great work

that will have an enormous impact on the improvement of global health and will help to fight

global poverty and I look forward to deepening our relationships there”, he said.

Another important challenge of the development of ICTD activities is the publication of the

researches. According to Bill Gates, many important and good activities dealing with ICT4D

have been done, but they are not expanded and shared as well as they should be.

He pointed out that innovations in technology

can help to combat poverty in the Third World

countries, but we need governments, people

and the private sector to all come together and

work towards this goal. They are many

challenges, and people, governments and the

private sector must join hands to achieve

development.

Bill Gates has finally insisted on the

importance of metric developments and on the

means to measure and to evaluate development

projects. According to him, all this should be

integrated in the very conception on projects.


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CARLOS A. PRIMO BRAGA, WORLD BANK

Dr Braga is the Director of the Economic Policy

and Debt in the Poverty Reduction and

Economic Management Network (PREM) at the

World Bank, which is the most important

network on development policy in the world.

He was a former lecturer at the University of

Sao-Paolo and he has written thousands of

books. The last one is titled Growth and

Innovation Dr Braga has been presented as a

visionary, he is the one who used the term

ICT4D before we talk about it.

Dr Braga’s analysis is titled ICT, DEVELOPMENT AND THE FINANCIAL CRISIS.

Dr. Braga discussed the opportunities and challenges of using ICT for economic development.

He argues that ICT cannot solve all problems related to development, but they can

significantly impact the development paths, as economies become increasingly services-

oriented, as companies shift from hierarchical structures to networked modes of production,

and as the "knowledge worker" emerges as a critical economic actor. He explained that

countries like Qatar are not affected by financial crisis because of the solidity of their

economies and because of their absences within the stock exchanges. He said the world

economy is leading by the US, Europe, and Japan.

ICT and development: Dr Braga mentioned that ICT contributes to several aspects of

development like economic growth, improved delivery of social services, greater

transparency, sustainable development and empowerment of the poor. Then, he listed some

problems related to the digital divide, as infrastructure (income levels, rural vs. urban),

digital literacy, content, gender, large companies vs. SMEs, e-business practices, etc. He

shows that the gap between northern and southern internet users is still important.

Meanwhile, the access to advanced ICT services is growing in developed countries.

Reality Check: Nowadays, many activities are undertaken to improve services, but some

challenges are to be faced with: infrastructures, regulatory environment, digital literacy,

content, etc.

ICT and financial crisis: Dr Braga also discussed the inferences of the current financial

crisis on the prospects for ICT investments in developing countries, and he explained that

the financial crisis will cause a sharp decline in global growth and will affect many

innovative sectors such as ICT; nonetheless there are reasons to be cheerful, he said. The

ICT industry is better positioned to confront the crisis today than in the aftermath of the

internet bubble; several governments see investments

in ICT as an integral part of the recovery efforts as the

telecom tends to be a leading indicator of recovery.

For western economies, he predicted that the worst is

not at the end. But developing countries will not be

really affected. He concluded that it is important to

coordinate the financial sector reform and to

synchronize macroeconomic responses.

Pascal Bekono & Dr Carlos Braga


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III. WORKSHOPS & PANELS

WORKSHOPS

The workshops were an opportunity for participants to improve their skills.

I. What Makes Good ICTD Research

This workshop aimed at establishing and at defining what makes a good ICTD research,

through a participatory approach. During the workshops, many gave a speech on how ICTD

research can be, and on how it should be. The many discussions within different working

groups with selected subjects proposed by each participant helped to find theses arguments:

- Make use of existing data by making data

accessible (required researchers to submit row

data, etc).

- Evaluation of research (publication of ideas

online, creation of online forums, make

accountancy of people underground, etc).

- Unintended consequences (have an existing

strategy, be honest, accept negative results,

facilitate informal information exchange, etc.)

II. Young researchers’ Workshop

This workshop intended to highlight young researchers' work. Many students, mostly

studying in computer sciences, presented their work and their feedback about their

immersion phase on ICT for Development. The discussions organized after each presentation

offered the opportunity to students to improve their work. Many of theses researches were

made in developing countries, with a real innovative aspect. Among all the researches, we

can cite: PDA for medical practitioners, Measuring e-learning impact primary, etc.

III. ICT curriculum Workshop

This workshop gathered ICTD instructors to discuss current effort in ICTD teaching, and

begin a conversation on the content and issues that ICTD instructors should be taught at the

undergraduate and graduate level for future researchers and practitioners.


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PANELS

Including the one which will be presented in the repot, four panels took place during the

ICTD2009 conference:

1) ICTD Research: premise

2) Mobile Web for Social Development

4) ICTD Evaluation 20/20: Voices from around the world

4) Assistive Technology for Developing countries, special invited panel, with experts like

Hamadoun Touré, Secretary-General of ITU.

ICTD evaluation 20/20: Voices from around the world

Panelists included Teresa Peters, of Bridges.org; Richard

Fuchs, Regional Director of Southeast and East Asia

IDRC; Professor Karen Fisher, from the University of

Washington; Akhtar Badshah, Senior Director for Global

Community Affairs Microsoft Corporation; and Richard

Heeks, from the University of Manchester.

Opening the discussion, Teresa Peters spoke about the

various developments that have taken place in IT sector. Richard Heeks added that “there is

a lack of systematic guidance in information, communication and technology (ICT). We need

to ensure that we keep pace with changes taking place in this sector and also take initiative

to keep abreast with the developments which have already taken place in this field.”

The panel also focused on the impact of ICT evaluation, examining how we make research

because it’s the meaningful way for success. The panelists argued that the evaluation is

useful for two reasons: proving and improving things. They recognized that many

researchers do not have time for evaluation.

Panelists recommended that researchers should be open to reports; they have to trust field

learning because that very trust is “key”.


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IV. SESSIONS

During the sessions, researchers presented their paper to the participants. Here are some

presentations that we have decided to report in this document.

Results from a Study of impact of E-government Projects in India

The paper presents the results from an assessment study of eight e-government projects in

India. The assessment framework measures the total value delivered by a project to

stakeholders on three dimensions:

a) Cost for the clients to have access to services;

b) Perception of the quality of service and governance;

c) Agency cost and revenue.

The project set out key findings and implications:

- Significant positive impacts on the cost to access services in most cases;

- Significant improvement in the quality of service and on the quality of governance in most

cases;

- Corruption was significantly reduced or even eliminated in five projects and had no impact

on others;

- Most projects are self-sustaining through revenues from user fee;

- Considerable variability in composite scores across projects, etc.

ICT4WHAT? Using the Choice Framework to Operationalise the Capability

Approach to Development

Dorothea Kleine, from the Royal Holloway of the University of London, is member of the

Centre for Developing Areas Research (CEDAR) and the ICT4D Collective/UNESCO Chair in

ICT4D. She has presented a paper dealing with the importance of the definition of theory

framework of development. In her article, she suggested an analytical framework based on

Amartya Sen’s capacities approach. For M. Sen, “development can be seen as a process of

expanding the real freedoms that people enjoy. […] Focusing particularly on people’s

capability to choose the lives they have reason to value” (Sen 1999, Development as Freedom,

Oxford, Oxford University Press). Mrs Kleine showed that the consequences of this

framework, for practical and theory research, on ICT for

Development are principally the use of a systemic and

holistic approach, better suited for multi-purpose

technologies, which impact in a systemic, pervasive and

transversal way; and the seeking of mechanisms allowing

people to express choice, (e.g. participatory monitoring

and evaluation, voucher schemes, participatory budgets,

participatory procurement, participatory tracking &

tracing). This proves the use of participative research

approaches and the implementation of projects whether

ICT are used or not.


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V. POSTER & DEMO

Theses sessions intended to present experiences of ICTD activities. Here are some selected

presentations.

We can also mention theses demos:

Cross Technology Comparison for Information Services in Rural Bangladesh;

Challenges in Health Information System Integration: A Human Agency Perspective, in Zanzibar;

Dimensions of IT Literacy in Arab Regions: A study in Barkha (Oman);

Numeric paper forms for NGOs.


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CONCLUSION

The successful three-day conference on ICTD organized in the Middle East for the first time,

reviewed applications of the information technology in developing countries, and its use in

bridging the divide between the developing and the developed countries.

NEXT EDITION:

During this 3rd ICTD conference, the preparation of the next edition (in 2010 or in 2011),

began. The University of Washington, near Seattle, USA and the University of London,

England, are the two host universities which are candidates for the organization of the next

ICTD. Their assets have been presented and a committee will proceed to the selection.

Seattle, University of Washington (USA) University of London (UK)


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ANNEX – QATARI CONNECTION

personal report - ningapi.ning.com/.../ictd2009_dqatar.pdf · 2017-05-28 · personal report 3 rd...

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