The Drum Beat 270: The Digital Pulse - I
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This issue of The Drum Beat will feature the analysis papers and health status trends included in "The Digital Pulse: The Current & Future Applications of Information & Communication Technologies for Developmental Health Priorities". Our next issue will feature the 60 programme experiences included within this online publication. Please let us know what you think - contact Warren Feek wfeek@comminit.com
The material cited in this issue was produced by The CI staff in support of work by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) to strengthen its ICT for Health initiatives. Opinions expressed are personal to authors and do not reflect policies of CIDA or The CI.
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Priorities
by Warren Feek of The Communication Initiative
with substantial support and guidance from Greg Long, Independent Consultant
An examination of information, analysis and findings related to the potential and actual role of new information technologies adding positive value to health and development strategies and programmes. The paper is structured as follows:
- First, 3 set of analysis papers - supporters, detractors and middle roaders.
- Second, classification of these think-pieces across a range of other areas.
- Third, summary descriptions of a number of programme experiences using ICTs to help advance their work. For better understanding and access these have been organised and classified according to the nature of the programme intervention: Database and Resource Centres; Social Development, Education and Advocacy; Networking and Dialogue; and, Telemedicine and High Medical Tools.
- Fourth, those programme experiences are also classified according to a more extensive set of groupings.
- And finally, some data has been gathered and compiled on the health status trends that provide the 'ground quality' for all health action, including by those using or seeking to use ICTs as part of their strategy and programmes.
Click here for the Table of Contents.
Click here to download a full PDF version [217pps].
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CHAPTER 1
State of Health ICT4D: Issues & Gaps
"In an era in which the state of health for the poorest countries, communities and people in the world is at best stagnant and is probably in decline, the potential value of the new information technologies for more effective health and development action can appear to be manna from heaven. With the qualities of rapid, two-way information flow, interactivity and mobility, the possibilities for improved health action stimulate and test the strategic and programming skills and imagination of international health and development workers..."
Click here for Chapter One.
CHAPTER 2
ICT for Development: A Review of Current Thinking
These analysis papers are divided into 3 groups: Proponents of ICT4D; Detractors of ICT4D; and Arguments for the Middle Road. Please see sections below.
There is also a Topic Search Index Chart that organises the same analysis pieces by methodological foci, subject area and economic orientation. Please see - [PDF: page numbers refer to the complete PDF document]
Click here for the Topic Search Index Chart [PDF].
Section 1: The ICT4D Proponents
1.Empowerment & Governance through Information & Communication Technologies: Women's Perspectives
This article examines the ways that ICT enabled networking processes create opportunities for women in the areas of empowerment and governance, analyses the challenges that lie ahead for an engendering of these processes, and presents a set of actions that will direct the rewards of ICT towards women and improve their overall quality of life...
2.Public Computer & Communications Centre (PC3) Project Bulgaria
This report reviews the process of design and implementation of the USAID funded PC3 telecentre project for rural Bulgaria. While Bulgaria is not a developing country and is quickly approaching EU ascension a digital divide exists within the country that separates urban and rural inhabitants. While little more than 10% of the population uses the Internet, over 60% of those users were located in Sofia. The assumption is that extension of ICTs to rural communities will contribute to their economic, democratic, and educational development...
3.Graemeen Telecom's Village Phone (VP) Programme: A Multi-Media Case Study TeleCommons Development
Group
4.NGOs & the Internet in Nepal
6.ICT & the Environment: Friends or Foes
7.Heralding ICT enabled Knowledge Societies
9.Information Program, Conceptual Map: Open Society Institute (OSI)
10.Information Program, Strategy: Open Society Institute (OSI)
11.DEEP Impact: Teachers & Technology
12.Understanding community health care: Implications for technology design
13.ICT & Ensuring Environmental Sustainability
14.The Chicken, the Egg & African Telecommunications
15.Women, Men & ICTs in Africa: Why Gender Is an Issue
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PULSE POLL
If you are journalist then you are a development communicator.
[For context, please see The Drum Beat 265]
Do you agree or disagree?
VOTE & Comment
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Section 2: The ICT4D Detractors
16.Take Five: A Handful of Essential for ICTs in Development
This article calls into question the viability of the belief that the ICT and technological revolution that has emerged will bring with it a social and economic revolution for the developing world. The author argues that knowledge alone will not be enough to liberate people from poverty and is concerned with both the inappropriateness and market-oriented implementation of ICTs in developing countries...
17.ICT & Poverty: The San Bushmen
In this article the author examines the flawed model that is currently in use in many ICT projects - a model based on giving the poor opportunities by teaching them new skills. The alternative is a model that seeks to utilise ICTs to engage the existing skills of the poor and create opportunity out of established capability...
18.Information Monopolies & the WTO
19.The Impact of Democratic Deficits on Electronic Media in Rural Development
20.The Internet: Towards a Deeper Critique
22.Pro-Poor & Gender Sensitive Information Technology: Policy & Practice
23.i-Development Not e-Development
24.Knowledge Facts, Knowledge Fiction: The Role of ICTs in Knowledge Management for Development
25.Failure, Success & Improvisation of Information Systems Projects in Developing Countries
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Section 3: The Middle Road
26.Themes & Issues In Telecentre Sustainability: Development Informatics - Working Paper No. 10
This short working paper examines some of the trends towards telecentre sustainability and improvements in access. The growth and diffusion of telecentres constitutes a 'movement,' albeit one that has that has been without any sense of systematic research or planning...
27.See No Evil: How Internet Filters Affect the Search for Online Health Information
The intent of the study was to evaluate how Internet filters employed in schools and libraries affect the ability of young individuals to locate non-pornographic health information on the web. It systematically measured the effectiveness of six different filtering products at blocking pornography and the rate at which health sites were also blocked...
28.Shouting To Be Heard: Public Service Advertising in a New Media Age
29.Participatory Rural Communication Appraisal (PRCA)
30.Discovering the "Magic Box": Local Appropriation of Information & Communication Technologies (ICTs)
31.HIV/AIDS & Information & Communication Technologies
32.Health, HIV/AIDS & ICT: A Needs Assessment
34.The African Internet: Impact, Winners & Losers
35.Reflect & ICTs: Project Summary & Concept Paper
36.Generation Rx.com: How Young People Use the Internet for Health Information
37.Radio & the Internet: Mixing Media to Bridge the Divide
38.Missing the Connection? Using ICTs in Education
39.Increasing the Relevance of ICT for Development
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HEALTH STATUS TRENDS
40.Appendix A - South Asia Regional Trends 1965 - 2001 [PDF]
41.Appendix B - Sub-Saharan Africa Regional Trends 1965 - 2001 [PDF]
42.Appendix C - Middle East & North Africa (MENA) 1965 - 2001 [PDF]
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