How partnerships can help ward off the digital divide in Africa

THE Digital Divide is defined as a gap between people who can effectively use new information and communication tools such as internet, mobile phones etc and those who cannot mostly probably due to ignorance or poverty. This gap has increasingly rendered human capacity into ineffective in terms of providing services and information giving to the community. But with the use of partnerships these can help clear the digital problem in a society. African continent is still lagging behind in the information technologies and their applications in the world, and the reason for this is increasingly because of the digital divide. Most African nations fails to coordinate their sector development activities basically due to lack of knowledge and unreliable access to the available Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tools. Statistics shows that about 80 percent of the African rural communities living in Sub-Saharan region are faced with extreme poverty and as a result, people’s social and economic development has been deteriorating continuously year after the year due to financial capability. Indeed the lack of communication skills and insufficiency use of modern communication tools has become a stumbling block of mankind development an aspect which slows down the pace of globalization in Africa. Some development analysts see the issue of the digital divide as a cause of poverty and underdevelopment. They believe that as the global economy becomes more and more dependent on ICT, people who are not able to use the technologies will be increasingly excluded. Others point out that the digital divide is now part of an overall development divide and therefore opportunities for increasing communication channels should be seen as a core activity of development.

Foreigners in one of the local internet cafe, partnerships can help bridghe the digital divide in Africa.

In a bid to find solutions to local communities for ICT access problems, leaders and financial donors always collaborate mainly with the rural populations where the situation is worse, and the civil society to take stock of the reality of the situation and avoid proposing not only inappropriate, but unacceptable socio-cultural solutions. Everyone, especially the rural populations acknowledges that modern ICTs are wonderful tools for development and efficient management which however ensures a conducive working environment. In order to embrace ICTs as key elements towards improving productivity and modern communication mechanisms, the rural area needs at least basic economic and social infrastructures such as roads, water, food, electricity, literacy (education) etc. These incentives cannot be attained unless government have to set a special fund in their national budgets to run the projects. But it’s unfortunate that, most African governments depends on the donor funding to ease their development processes, hence the idea of such prospective projects ends up in vain if sufficient money is not available for the intended purposes. But through partnerships people are brought together to share a common interest that consumes valuable resources as well as time, and efforts that might not be available in a single organization or institution to end the digital problem. Partnerships can be described as a mutual, supportive arrangement between organizations, agencies, businesses, and/or communities with the purpose of addressing a problematic situation.

A Maasai moran communicating by using a mobile phone. Through partnership, Africa can ward off the existing digital divide in rural communities.

In this spirit, individuals, businesses, organizations, institutions, communities, and governing bodies need to collectively unite the creative minds and develop ideas that will address the issue to end the multifaceted problem of the Digital Divide. This is the power of partnerships whose key is to involve people that have expertise and interest in these areas with the purpose of acquiring a complete picture of the variables involved and finding solutions to the problems identified. This can be done by advocacy through various IT organizations, educators, social service providers, research institutions and government officials. These groups need to work collectively on the issue and disseminate the group activities and findings. The Digital Divide is an enormous dilemma for all people, not just people with disabilities. By demonstrating that partnerships are a successful and effective tool in addressing the variables involved in the Digital Divide, it will be easier to get others to support and participate in these efforts. According to one researcher, Dr. Taylor Kearns of the US based International Center for Disability Resources for Internet (ICDRI), partnerships are tools that can help address issues in all their complexity, identify options, and deliver resources more powerfully and effectively than any one organization or business can possibly do. However, in order for partnerships to work, they need to be organized, implemented, and evaluated successfully. Those involved in partnerships need to have a vested interest in the success of the partnership. The digital gap is the least of concerns of the rural world as it is plagued by internal social problems which are common to several African countries. At national level, there is great need to curb the extreme disparities between towns and countryside at different areas such as health, education and training, drinking water, transportation, etc. The important issue here is how ICTs can solve numerous social, economic, agricultural and digital problems currently afflicting the global village, continents and governments as well.

ICT training is vital for people gain knoiwledge to ward off the digital divide in Africa.

Over the past eight years or so there have been several projects in Africa that have brought Information and Communication Technologies to rural and other disadvantaged communities. Some of these have worked well, many others have had problems related to technical, managerial, social or financial aspects. In Tanzania for examples, there are about 20 most famous Tele-centers which are donor-funded such as the ones established by ITU- UNESCO-IDRC. These have shown that some ICTs are welcomed and used when established in rural areas of Africa. These offer some useful services, though are often very expensive to use. The centers are financially sustainable though their link to wider development is questionable. In several countries there are ICT projects attached to specific government project where the technology supports an existing service. The largest of these are the many school ICT projects (Schoolnet Africa works in over 20 African countries). There are other examples of ICT being used in health clinics to support Tele-health and Tele-medicine, of ICTs in agricultural extension projects and in Small-business support. The IT training in most parts of Africa is still inadequately financed despite being the important sector which helps to speed up globalization processes and the disadvantaged areas in Africa face great challenges. This is due to the fact that, in many areas there is great poverty - with many countries facing famine. Infrastructure is lacking in many areas, and few people have the formal skills in ICT. However, the difficulty of running ICT projects in remote areas has led to the failure or difficulties with many projects. Lack of technical skills, spare parts, finances and other issues compound the difficulty for many of these centres. There are also a number of smaller community based ICT projects, with the equipment being used by a community organization or NGO to support their services, as with community radio or other local development projects. In rural Tanzania, the IT sector through the program formed two years ago known as Lang Management Program (LAMP), has introduced internet facilities to a number of districts in the country in a bid to bridge the digital divide. The program that is conducted under the auspices of the Tanzania Commission for Science and Technology (COSTECH), aims at helping the poor get more access to the ICTs in the country. According to COSTECH’s project coordinator Mr. Theophillus Mlaki, who is also the Director of Information and Documentation, the ICT project would create a lot of benefits to farmers and livestock keepers.