Document(s) 9 of 11

Introduction

The workshop participants were asked to suggest programs of action — within the three priority areas of land use, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and health — for the Youth Leadership Program for Information and Communication Technologies and Community Development in Africa (ALPID). This chapter outlines the implementation plans suggested by the participants.

Land use and environmental management

The group first analyzed the issues in the land-use sector and then compartmentalized them into problem areas, using the Acacia categories of policy, infrastructure, content, and organization. ALPID’s objectives in this priority area are

• To use information and communication technologies (ICTs) to improve quality of life, agricultural productivity, and incomes; and

• To ensure environmental security for farmers and peasants, as well as incorporating gender equity and sound environmental management.

The intention is that the program will make it possible to collect and popularize indigenous survival techniques, help farmers understand weather patterns and climate change, provide information on investment in crops, and measure and process outputs.

Initially, ALPID will need to analyze policies on ICTs, land use and environmental management, and youth, jointly at the regional and the national levels. This analysis should take into account the means to design information products to positively influence policy change, empower communities to effect policy reform, and enable farmers to start up their own schemes.

Policy on land use and the environment, if it is to be any good at all, must address the poor coordination of the farmer-assistance programs run by governments, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and others. Top-down approaches to resource management, bias against migrant farmers and women, and the subordination of indigenous knowledge need to be discouraged through the implementation of effective policy. Current policy on customary gender patterns of crop ownership and management should be examined and, if need be, changed to create an environment that does not allow gender bias in resource ownership.

In planning its infrastructure needs, ALPID should critically analyze physical facilities for telecommunications and ICT support. The target countries should have adequate energy sources to support the needed infrastructure. ICTs should have an interactive rating and may include the following:

• Datacasting, which can also be used for commercial purposes;

• Satellites (low Earth-orbiting and very small aperture terminals);

• Computers (solar powered); and

• Touch screens for ICT interfacing.

In addition, the principles of affordability and cost-effectiveness should guide ALPID’s choice of ICT infrastructure; in other words, it should choose infrastructure that is easily sustainable, serviceable, and maintainable.

The ICTs should be able to provide information relevant to the needs of the communities, such as the tracking of weather and climate patterns; information on effective product management and modern methods of storage; policy-related and market information; and information on efficient production and farming systems (where to get raw materials, local prices of goods, etc.). The programs used should be easily adaptable to the communities’ changing information needs and allow for networking within both local farming communities and the East African region. The main challenge for ALPID is to find ways to share essential information without intimidating the farmers.

To ensure effective programing, a needs assessment must be carried out before implementation. This will identify issues to be addressed and allow for the presentation of proposals to implement the program. In accessing information needs, program planners should use established groups, such as women’s guilds and youth groups, as some of these groups have already been active in advocacy regarding the issues that ALPID seeks to address. Before the program starts, youth should be involved in internship activities in the relevant sectors, as this effort would add value to their impact in the program.

A coalition of NGOs, funding agencies, and private-sector companies should be invited to support the project. These partners would benefit from the new service and provide corporate or institutional support. Maintenance fees could be collected through user charges, which the user would pay either directly or through cooperatives, farmer associations, or government facilities.

Small and medium-sized enterprises

Within the SME sector, firms with 1–10 employees are classified as microenterprises; firms with 11–50 employees, as small enterprises; and firms with 51–100 employees, as medium-sized enterprises. According to the selection criteria for this program, SMEs are defined as firms with 3–50 employees. Firms of this size will be chosen because they

• Present opportunities for enhanced indigenization within the industry;

• Have a high prospects for growth and employment;

• Have an extensive presence in rural Africa;

• Experience a severe lack of market information; and, most important,

• Make a large contribution to African industry, as they currently constitute the majority (about 70%) of continental enterprises in Africa.

Also, it was noted that larger businesses generally have their own mechanisms and resources for sourcing and synthesizing information and, as such, would not derive the same benefit from the program.

Among SMEs, the selected divisions are those of manufacturing and services, including the agroprocessing, construction, transportation, metalwork, electrical, electronics, and information technology subsectors. A lack of appropriate and readily available information has greatly inhibited these subsectors’ productivity and restricted their markets.

The principle objectives of the program within the SME priority area are

• To enhance the productivity of the sector;

• To increase SMEs’ access to local and international markets;

• To have a positive impact on SMEs’ incomes; and

• To improve opportunities for SMEs to access international investment resources.

In addition, empowering youth with effective skills to use ICT applications and to provide information to SMEs will enable the youth to deliver the program effectively.

Successful implementation would be ensured by initially identifying the SME sector’s information needs. This should be augmented by continual needs assessment and continual consolidation of an inventory of up-to-date information on SMEs. Possible sources of information are the SMEs, District Information Officers, NGOs, and community-based organizations. A wealth of information is already available, and this should be accessed and incorporated. Further, information for the SMEs should be packaged appropriately, such as in the form of flyers or databases.

The program will use sustainable technologies, especially taking into consideration the lack of electricity or infrastructural support in many rural African areas. Some appropriate and sustainable technologies have been identified:

• Land-line communication systems (telephone, fax, etc.);

• Mobile communication systems (mobile telephony, pager, etc.);

• Public switched data communication networks (Packet);

• High-frequency and very high frequency radio (datacasting), with the provision of services at low cost for rural Africa;

• Satellite systems (Inmarsat, VSAT, Domsat, Rascom, etc.);

• Mass media (newspapers, radio, and television);

• Video equipment (including playback tapes);

• Mobile cinemas;

• Computers and databases;

• Internet and e-mail;

• Intranets;

• Local-area networks; and

• Wide-area networks.

ALPID will strongly emphasize the use of simplified technologies — graphics, touch screens, and local languages (for example, Swahili, Luganda). The final choice of technology would depend on localities and content.

The choice of ICTs will depend on the centre of operation. For instance, hubs should be created to ensure access for all in major towns, whereas telecentres can be used at the provincial, district, division, and location levels. However, each of these centres should have

• Mass-media and ICT facilities, such as layout packages (PageMaker, CorelDRAW!, etc.);

• Audiovisual presentation aids, such as televisions, video, telephone, fax, and radio; and

• Access to mass-media output, such as newspapers, trade magazines, and the Internet.

Because of competition, SME’s information is never broadcast and therefore many traditional delivery mechanisms, such as the chief’s baraza, cannot be used. ALPID will emphasize technical management, information training, and support for these ICT delivery mechanisms.

Using youth as delivery agents is one of the innovations of the program. The youth should be graduates of universities or colleges, as older people, especially in the rural areas, consider these learned individuals to be young leaders. ALPID’s volunteers will undergo training for 2–3 months to gain proficiency in using ICTs, followed by hands-on deployment and participation in the exchange program. Their responsibilities would include carrying out a needs assessment and research for continuity, ensuring sustained interest in the program, and training end-users. Youth workers should receive enough remuneration to cover basic living, travel, and medical expenses. ALPID should take gender balance into consideration when recruiting the youth.

To be successful, the program should identify the major stakeholders and build strong partnerships (Table 1). The working group classified the following as the main stakeholders in this initiative: NGOs, ICT professionals and providers, SME groups and associations, governments, research institutions, sponsors, donors, youth, and telecommunication providers. ALPID’s partners should have

• Proven experience in project implementation and delivery of nonfinancial services;

• Experience dealing with youth or volunteers and human-resource development training;

• Capabilities in project financial management;

• An intimate knowledge of local operating conditions; and

• An existing broad network of operations.

ALPID should bear in mind the differences in institutional capabilities between countries.

To create a conducive policy environment, the program should carry out a review of current policies and identify gaps. ALPID should then lobby the relevant authorities for changes to be made, where necessary, such as in ICT tariffs and regulations; for privatization of posts and telecommunication departments; or for expansion of easily accessible Internet services.

As program monitoring and evaluation are crucial aspects, ALPID will need to establish impact indicators, channels for feedback from end-users, and transparent accounting procedures. It should put these in place with appropriate data-capture forms and with personnel well trained in project management and problem-solving.

Sustainability could be enhanced by ensuring that SMEs begin to participate as early as possible, thus encouraging their ownership of the program. To meet program maintenance costs, ALPID should use existing infrastructure, where practical, and have a graduated fee structure for services offered. ALPID could publish and sell the information it compiles for a fee.

Health

The program will target the following health subsectors: adolescent health and sexuality, preventive health care, and curative medicine. Common strategies for addressing these needs are the following:

• Carrying out a needs assessment (what information is needed?);

• Setting selection criteria for youth and participating communities;

• Identifying training needs;

• Developing training programs;

• Identifying key players;

• Identifying available resources;

• Establishing telecentres;

• Training peer educators; and

• Ensuring gender balance.

The program should adopt these strategies and use existing infrastructure and competencies, established health groups, and community information centres as focal points to ensure community participation.

The integration of humans and technologies should be carried out using user-friendly packages that replicate best practices. Appropriate media for the transfer of health information include

• Computers with e-mail and Internet access;

• Audiovisual equipment and radios; and

• Manuals, posters, and theatre performances.

An enabling policy environment must be in place to ensure that these activities conform to ethical and legal requirements pertaining to the use of health information or medical strategies.

The selection of sites will emphasize currently underserved locations with a high incidence of health problems, such as border and fishing communities in East Africa, where cross-community interaction is frequent. To reduce implementation costs, ALPID should find sites where it can build on existing capacities. Where possible, a regional NGO should help implement the program. The effects, successes, and failures of the program should be tracked with effective monitoring and evaluation systems, including

• Continuous assessment;

• Operational research;

• A performance-monitoring framework; and

• Tracer and baseline studies.

Youth should be involved in the program at three stages: planning, implementation, and assessment. Motivation for their involvement in the program could include a stipend of about 15 000 KES, plus travel expenses, and involvement in an exchange program with other youth volunteers (in 2000, 74.35 Kenyan shillings [KES] = 1 United States dollar [USD]). They should receive 2–3 months of training and then be deployed in the field.

Sustainability could be enhanced by promoting a government-private-sector alliance, encouraging community participation, and instituting a resource mobilization plan with cost-sharing for users. If the program is to take effect, there must be efforts to introduce the ICT into the cultural setting in which it is to be used. Also needed will be training and sensitization on the use of the technology. When selecting the youth leaders, ALPID would find it beneficial to include those from the participating communities.

¹ Compiled from workshop discussions and the reports of the working groups.

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Document(s) 9 of 11