Slashdot Mirror
More Thoughts On How to Wire Senegal
An anonymous reader submits "Last month Slashdot published a story on the Peace Corps' plans to wire Senegal. Now Peace Corps Online has published an article by a volunteer who taught computers in West Africa for two years who recommends that the White House's Digital Freedom Initiative abandon the Western paradigm of 'a computer on every desk' and borrow a lesson from telephony in third-world countries. Since a residential telephone line is a luxury item in West Africa, the 'communication center' has flourished as a private business even in the smallest of towns where it generates profits while sharing the high cost of telecommunication among the whole community. This user model coupled with deregulation of VoIP can be the key to implementation of computer technology in poor countries."
I believe they were calling it the "Ring of Fire" and it was Lucent who was putting most of it up. But I haven't heard anything on that in a couple of years.
---- El diablo esta en mis pantalones! Mire, mire!
By Trevor Harmon
April 6, 2003
Since 1961, the Peace Corps has been sending volunteers to Ghana, West Africa, to work in education, business development, and environmental protection projects. Most of these volunteers work in remote areas where poverty is extreme and the small rural communities have the greatest need for teachers, engineers, and other skilled professionals. I was surprised, then, when I learned that the Peace Corps had placed a volunteer in Accra, the largest and wealthiest city in Ghana, to teach computer literacy at an upscale high school. I asked a Ghanaian friend why Accra should get computer experts when the villages up north must surely have the greater need for computer skills and information technology.
"When you're talking about computers in Africa," he said, "every city is a village."
This simple statement explains the motivation behind the Digital Freedom Initiative (DFI), an ambitious new project sponsored by the U.S. Department of Commerce. Beginning with a three-year, $6.5 million pilot program in Senegal, its long-term goal is to bring the benefits of computer technology and Internet access to developing countries. Several government agencies are participating, including the Peace Corps, USAID, and the USA Freedom Corps. Private companies are also welcome to join the project. Hewlett-Packard and Cisco, two of the largest computer technology companies in the world, have already signed on.
As a pilot project, DFI is still quite new, and the details of its implementation have not been made public. Several documents are available on the DFI website1, but because the project is in its early stages, these documents are short on specifics. Instead, they offer plenty of nebulous phrases such as "enable innovation", "leverage leadership", and "enhance business competitiveness". Likewise, the press releases from Hewlett-Packard and Cisco claim that they will "co-invent locally relevant IT solutions" and "fuel technical education". Exactly how these organizations will accomplish such monumental tasks is unclear.
The dot-com boom and bust proved that computers and Internet access are not goals in themselves; they are merely tools. The directors of DFI should be careful not to fall into the trap of providing web browsers and disk drives to developing countries and simply hoping that economic prosperity will follow. Still, if every city in the developing world is a technological village, then even a little bit of progress can have a big impact. With the right planning, DFI can provide a foundation for growth in countries like Senegal and Ghana while helping to satisfy the global need for computer technology.
In the paragraphs that follow, I'll explain the current state of computer technology in West Africa and how it could change as a result of DFI. I'll also dissect the DFI's stated goals and speculate on their potential for success. Finally, I'll highlight a few possible shortcomings and offer some recommendations for future projects. Computer Access In West Africa Today, access to computers in West Africa is at about the same level that it was in the United States during the mid-1980s. Large banks in the region use computers for processing transactions, government agencies track documents and records with computer databases, and many high schools have at least one computer on campus for administrative tasks or the science lab (see Figure 1). In the home, however, computers are still a luxury available only to the wealthy. The concept of a "personal" or "family" computer does not exist, or at least is a very new phenomenon, just as it was in 1984 when the first Apple Macintosh went on sale in the U.S. The perception of computers by the general public is also similar to that of the American public fifteen years ago. Many West Africans understand the need for computer technology in business, science, and education, but most aren't sure how computers can help them in t
I just returned from a three-week backpacking tour of Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. In general, they're not in as bad of shape as Africa, but some parts still suffer the same difficulities with access and utility availability.
I told folks I'd keep in touch via e-mail, but was careful to always caveat that with "as long as I can find internet access". Next time, I'll drop the caveat. Places with phones have an "internet cafe". And they're often full.
In my constant pursuit of fluent spanish, I thought I'd have to find another bilingual computer professional to learn the spanish translation of computer-centric terms like e-mail, web, internet, scanner, mouse, instant messaging and the like. If you find yourself in the same situation, ask a kid on the bus. The older generations aren't there yet, but the kids have it down. I was amazed.
The Economist did a good article recently on [somewhat] related issues of access, business and money. Instead of working to deliver telephones, they give an account of the beer man. It's a good read. Trucking in Cameroon
Cheers,
J.J.
Senegal has a successful chain of cybercafes, the Joko Clubs, where internet access is available to everyone. It was started by a popular Senegalese singer, not by the government or outsiders.
I grew up with my dad in USAID. He still works for them. That is what the US does, feed and teach, try to build the infrastructure. Or at least, what we try to do. It doesn't always work of course, but usually it does. At least until the next civil war. It is hard to get critical mass on these types of projects. At least, with the funds we give our forgein aid projects.
'Sensible' is a curse word.