ONLINE RESOURCES
--- Free Internet-based training site
--- Coaching and mentoring Sites
--- Business acumen. Helping young people to succeed in business in Eastern Europe

ARTICLES
--- Debunking Knowledge Management
--- Challenges to bridging the digital divide: Building better on ramps to the information highway by Paula Y. Bagasao, Ph.D., Elsa Macias, Ph.D., Sara Jones, and Harry P. Pachon, Ph.D.

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NEWS

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Taken from the Media Beat - August 15, 1999 (edited by Warren Feek)

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Finns To Help South Development - Tanzania

The Guardian Limited Newspaper - August 11, 1999 - By Guardian Reporter

Tanzania and Finland yesterday sealed an agreement to implement Phase III of

the Rural Integrated Project Support (RIPS) Programme in Lindi and Mtwara.

There will be participatory monitoring and evaluation, training, and

finally, use of video and radio as means of fostering participatory

Taken from the Media Beat - August 15, 1999 (edited by Warren Feek)

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Information Is Vital To Planning, Leaders Told - Papua New Guinea

The National - August 10, 1999

Rabaul - The Rabaul district administrator, Isimel Puipui, has commended his

health officers for initiating an information, education and communication

(IEC) workshop for Rabaul Town councillors. He said that information was a

----------------------------------------

Indian E-Commerce Forecast To Reach $575m By 2002

By Uday Lal Pai

InternetNews India Correspondent

[13 August 199] India will be among the four Asian markets to have more than

five million Internet users and e-commerce will account for $575 million by

financial year 2002-03, says IDC India, Indian arm of the global IT market

research.

But a good number of companies in India have still not entered the field,

says another survey.

According to Ravi Sangal, president of IDC (India), the low cost of

computers, increasing penetration of the Internet and cyber laws will fuel

the growth of e-commerce in India. Last year (1998-99) transactions over the

Net in India stood at a mere $ 30 million.

Ravi said that initially, the business to consumer (B to C) segment would

account for the deals done on the Net while the rest would be Business to

Business (B to B). Cyber Laws are yet to be approved by Parliament.

The survey also revealed that most PC owners would plan to get their PCs

connected to the Internet. The current installed base of PCs in India is

estimated at 3.2 million (legal markets). IDC expects annual sales of PCs to

jump to 2.62 million units by 2001-02.

The Indian IT market is set to become the third largest market in the Asia

Pacific region in four years time from its current fifth position. A 28 per

cent compounded annual growth rate between 1998-2003 would catapult India

into the third largest market after China and Australia, said Dane Anderson,

vice-president, computing systems, IDC Asia pacific.

With five million users adding to the Net, India will be the second largest

market in Asia Pacific. China is expected to have over 15 million users,

followed by India with about 8 million, and Australia and Korea slightly

behind.

However, Indian companies are yet to tap e-commerce potential, according to

yet another survey. A survey result released by India's market research

company IMRB revealed that Indian companies are optimistic about the

potential of this medium. Companies expect e-commerce to contribute nearly

17% to their turn over by 2004.

At present, however, of the 318 chief information officers surveyed, only 20

percent said that their organizations were trying to use e-commerce to some

extent. The remaining 80 per cent are still in the process of gearing up for

the show.

According to the respondents, the key barriers in the adoption of e-commerce

include lack of proper commercial and legal system, lack of infrastructure,

awareness and a conducive environment.

However, the department of electronics (DoE) is also bullish on e-commerce.

"The nest millennium will be one of e-culture. We expect that E-C will

account for $ 175 million in India over the next two years. Every 1.67

seconds, one new user will sign up on the Net" said Ravindra Gupta,

[from the World Bank's Development News (12 August 1999)]

WITH CONCERTS AND WEB SITE, UN AGENCY ATTACKS POVERTY.

Bidding to fight poverty with music and megabits, the UNDP and Cisco Systems

Inc., the No. 1 maker of data communications gear, have enlisted a dozen

popular entertainers to kick off an Internet-based initiative to help the

world's poor, the New York Times (p.A8) reports. The new project, called

Netaid, appears to represent the most extensive partnership the UN has ever

formed with a private enterprise in trying to relieve poverty in the

developing world.

Ultimately, the hope is that even tiny villages in the Third World will have

public computers linked to the Internet, adds the Washington Post (p.E1).

Local artisans might use them to find markets abroad, the logic goes, and

farm cooperatives might use them to study up-to-date agricultural

techniques. The UNDP's new Administrator, Mark Malloch Brown, described the

NetAid effort as "thoroughly subversive, in ways that old-line dictators

have trouble getting a handle on." He said he is betting that even rulers

who don't want peasants or factory workers to have global access to

information will be reluctant to shut down or expel the UNDP for providing it.

NetAid's public debut is scheduled for Oct. 9, when the group will stage

overlapping concerts at Giants Stadium in New Jersey, Wembley Stadium in

London and the Palais des Nations in Geneva, featuring musicians including

Jimmy Page, Pete Townshend and Jewel, the NYT piece adds. The MTV and VH1

cable television channels have agreed to televise the concerts in the United

States and the BBC will televise the concerts in Britain, the story says.

But Cisco and Malloch Brown say that Netaid is not just another charity

telethon. The heart of Netaid is not the concerts, they say, but the Web

site ( www.netaid.org). "The money raised is not the measure of success of

this project", Malloch Brown is quoted as saying. "For me the money will

come, but it will come out of building a very large number of people in the

millions who will keep coming back to the issues through the Web site," he

adds.

FOR RELEASE: 18 AUGUST 1999 AT 14:00:00 ET US

Social behavior transformed with one new gene

For the first time, researchers have transformed an antisocial mouse into a

more social animal by genetically manipulating the distribution of a

specific receptor in the brain.

Neuroscientists at Emory University created a transgenic mouse by inserting

a gene from a prairie vole, a rodent species known for its fidelity and

sociability. The new mouse showed the brain receptor distribution and even

adopted the social behaviors of the gregarious prairie vole. Their work is

described in the August 19 issue of the journal Nature.

ONLINE RESOURCES

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Taken from the TrainingZone LearningWire - Issue 61

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Free Internet-based training site

Freeskills is a new UK site offering free training via site downloads. There

are presently 50 courses available, mostly in the computing field, and the

site owners plan to publish around 100 more courses every month. You'll need

Adobe Acrobat to open the documents. The company's slogan - "Open your mnd

Taken from the TrainingZone LearningWire - Issue 61

---

Coaching and mentoring Sites

-----------

Several new sites and resources have come to our attention this week. The

Linkage Inc site has posted an interesting article on 'The dynamics of

Wendy Hearn sends details of her coaching pages as well as her online

resources for both coaching and stress reduction at work. You'll find her

and there's more information about coaching practices from Bob Griffiths, -

----------------------------------------

Business acumen. Helping young people to succeed in business in Eastern

Europe

contributor(s): Ken Roberts - University of Liverpool

Young people in Eastern Europe, hit by high rates of unemployment, are

bearing the brunt of the costs of transition to a market economy. How can

they be given a share of the benefits? Is it sensible to encourage them to

become self-employed or are the risks of failure too steep? What help do

small enterprises in Eastern Europe need in order to develop into sturdy

pillars of the new market economies? Recent research co-ordinated by the

University of Liverpool shows that young people from all kinds of family and

educational backgrounds are able to establish themselves in business with

very limited resources in Eastern Europe. But even capable young

entrepreneurs need further assistance if their enterprises are to progress

To receive this piece by email, send a message to the following email

Leave the SUBJECT field BLANK, and copy the following text into the BODY of

the message:

ARTICLES

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DEBUNKING KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT

Knowledge management is a highly hyped term. At the same time, it is a

highly under-utilised resource in the fight to maximise the benefits of

knowledge sharing in the cut-throat world of business. That's the view of

Trent Rossini, Business Solutions director of The Internet Solution. If

competitive conditions demand greater productivity from your employees,

there is duplication of effort across the organisation or people battle to

find the right information at the right time, these are sure signs that a

knowledge management strategy is required to solve some of your problems.

"There are a number of reasons why a situation like this could develop,"

says Rossini. "The organisation may have been weakened as a result of a

merger, acquisition, or downsizing, it may simply not be maximising the

benefits of existing groupware or messaging systems, and therefore is not

achieving the desired ROI from technology." Nevertheless, a knowledge

management strategy needs to be linked to business strategy. It should focus

on knowledge transfer on an immediate and ongoing basis. In the long run, an

effective knowledge management strategy will embrace practices and business

processes that create new knowledge. Balancing tacit and explicit knowledge

is the key to implementing a knowledge management strategy. The vision

should be to create knowledge repositories or "corporate memory".

Building a business case should happen when your organisation wants to

create knowledge-sharing practices to solve business problems. Examples of

such problems could be the loss of profitable customers because of poor

service and long lead times, an increase in inventory holding costs, loss of

market share, continuous under-performance of business units, poor product

quality from suppliers or declining sales from newly launched products.

Correctly implemented knowledge-sharing practices solve these business

problems permanently. It is best to build both top management and shop floor

commitment into knowledge-sharing strategies. The organisation should build

the business case for implementing knowledge-sharing practices by achieving

three key milestones:

* Building commitment to a knowledge management strategy - where the

deliverable should be a knowledge management strategy document and executive

mandate

* Focusing the knowledge management strategy - where the deliverables

include documents and action plans on knowledge management projects, a

knowledge management processes, champions and metrics

* Functional requirements for the knowledge management solution - where the

deliverables include building knowledge portals that customise the knowledge

management technology solution.

The critical success factors need to be closely managed, and include

integration of knowledge-sharing with existing business processes, a

compelling need for change, richness and relevance of information,

technology that is embedded into existing technology solutions and "quick

wins" that help build organisation-wide commitment. In conclusion, the place

to start is with the high-value business issues, such as improved customer

satisfaction. The "quick wins" strategy may mean implementing a pilot

project, and roll out to the organisation thereafter. Any knowledge

management project and implementation plan needs to be goal-directed.

e-Commerce/IS e-Commerce Value Propositions/Knowledge Management

Challenges to bridging the digital divide: Building better on ramps to the

information highway

by Paula Y. Bagasao, Ph.D., Elsa Macias, Ph.D., Sara Jones, and Harry P.

Pachon, Ph.D.

The digital divide threatens to deepen the gaps in U.S. society, unless

communities work together to ensure equal access to and benefits from

advanced information technologies for all. The Tomás Rivera Policy

Institute's Digital Steppingstones project is looking at how various public

programs are working at building better on ramps to the information highway

for low-income and minority communities. This report is based on extensive

research including national and regional dialogs as well as site visits to

programs in five metropolitan areas -- Chicago, New York, Los Angeles,

Houston and Miami.

The Digital Steppingstones researchers identified challenges that must be

addressed in order to develop and sustain programs that provide equal access

to low-income communities. Parent and civic leaders must buy into community

programs. Program leaders must develop strategies to sustain programs

financially and regularly upgrade equipment. In addition to broad-based

access to computers, programs must focus on developing user literacy.

Researchers also identified the central roles that staff training and

program evaluation play.

Harry P. Pachon, Ph.D. Rodolfo O. de la Garza, Ph.D. President Vice

President of Research Tomás Rivera Policy Institute Tomás Rivera Policy

Institute

Introduction

Federal, state and local governments, as well as the corporate world agree

that providing information and communication technologies in K-12 schools is

a key policy issue. Governors, mayors, school superintendents, principals,

teachers, and parents all see computers and the Internet as critical tools

for helping children learn the digital literacy they need to navigate in the

information age.

While schools are a primary location for accessing and teaching computer

skills, libraries and community centers also provide vital public access to

computers and the Internet for both adults and children. As we approach the

new millenium, it is critical that the nation build and strengthen these

public technology access points for the millions of people who do not have

computers in their homes or at their places of work.

Earlier research by the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute established that most

technology "have nots" live in low-income communities.1 Across the United

States, only about 20 percent of households earning less than $20,000 have

home computers compared to 80 percent of households earning over $75,000. In

fact, this "digital divide" is growing, according to a recent report by the

National Telecommunications Information Administration (NTIA) of the

Department of Commerce. The report, "Falling through the Net: A report on

telecommunications and the information technology gap in America," documents

that between 1997 and 1998 the disparity in Internet access at home between

those at the highest and lowest education levels increased by 25 percent.

The gap increased to 29 percent when highest and lowest income households

were compared. The report also documents the "digital divide" between ethnic

groups with whites and Asian/Pacific Islanders continuing to outpace black

and Hispanic low-income households in computer ownership and Internet use.

TRPI's research on information technology, which began in 1986, has provided

researchers and policy makers with up-to-date information on how the

Hispanic community is faring on the information highway. TRPI researchers

find that many Latinos from low-income communities, especially those with

lower educational levels and limited English speaking skills, lag behind

their non-Hispanic counterparts in access to computers and the Internet.

However, the rate of use among middle income Latinos is nearing that of

middle income whites.

In mid 1997 TRPI launched a major three-year research initiative aimed at

shedding light on public access points that can bridge the gaps between the

technology "haves" and "have nots." The Digital Steppingstones Project

(DSS), with generous support from The W.K. Kellogg Foundation, focuses on

three learning environments -- K-12 public schools, libraries, and community

centers. The project builds on the institute's earlier work by looking at

low-income communities, various ethnic groups, and access points outside the

home.

TRPI is now mid-way through its DSS research project and has learned much

about exemplary technology programs in low-income settings in five

metropolitan areas -- Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Houston, and Miami.

TRPI researchers began by collecting data for each of the five urban areas.

The second phase of the research focused on how to establish and nurture

effective information technology-based programs. This phase involved

discussions with over 250 policy makers, program and community leaders, and

private sector representatives.

Summaries of discussions during TRPI site visits to the key cities, regional

roundtables and at the TRPI national conference held in Irvine, Calif., in

fall 1998 are available at TRPI's website www.trpi.org.

This policy brief provides early findings on the overall research questions

that guide the project:

* What roles do advanced information technologies play in low-income and

minority communities throughout the United States?

* Where, how and by whom are these new technologies being used?

* How are information technologies being used to improve the lives of people

in these communities?

* What can be done through policy and program initiatives to ensure that

people from all backgrounds and circumstances can have equal access to these

new technologies and public access points?

Preliminary findings

TRPI researchers have identified the issues that must be addressed in order

to develop and sustain information technology programs. Particular

challenges for programs in low-income and disadvantaged communities were

clearly outlined by participants in TRPI forums. They are:

1. Equal access. Policy makers, program staff, parents, community members,

students, library patrons, and the private sector must be committed to

making information technologies equally accessible to all.

2. Recognizing IT as a tool. Information technology is a tool for addressing

needs, rather than an end in and of itself. Programs in the communities

under study use information technologies to address various local community

needs such as improving student performance, job training, and providing

convenient delivery of social services including health and citizenship

education. Participants felt that technology should be used for more than

just teaching word processing. Schools, libraries, and community centers

should integrate technology and education so that technology can be used to

enhance critical thinking skills of all learners.

3. Need for user literacy. Merely having computers and other technologies

available is not sufficient. Study participants emphasized that people need

to know how to use them effectively. Basic literacy skills such as reading,

writing, mathematics, critical thinking, and technology skills are all

necessary in order to effectively use technology in schools, libraries and

community centers. A variety of programs will be needed to build these user

skills within disadvantaged communities, especially in those with large

numbers of limited English speakers.

4. Infrastructure barriers. Information technology infrastructures vary

across and within communities and public access points. Researchers found

that small and older facilities, the absence of appropriate technology

policies, lack of equipment and software, and inadequate human technical

capacity remain major obstacles for schools, libraries, and community

centers that serve low-income communities. Although they acknowledged

assistance from the public, private and philanthropic sectors, they also

noted a dramatic need for more.

5. Program sustainability. Establishing appropriate programs with equal

access is a first step, but it is not enough. Program leaders must develop

strategies to sustain programs, by addressing ongoing funding requirements,

by keeping pace with technology changes, and by ensuring adequate technical

capacity. Creative funding strategies are required to accommodate these

needs. Participants pointed out that programs often falter when a program is

dependent on only one person's efforts.

6. Staff capacity. Another critical ingredient for a successful program is

adequate staff capacity.

Programs need to attract, develop and retain teachers, librarians, and

program staff who value technologies and have experience using them. In most

disadvantaged communities the cost of hiring, training, attracting and

retaining qualified staff is heavy.

During five day-long roundtable discussions with people directly involved in

information technology programs in the five cities, the following findings

were highlighted:

* Parents and community leaders must buy into IT programs. Parents and

community leaders can play the role of strong program advocates. However,

TRPI learned that many parents worry about their children having easy access

to Internet content related to pornography and violence at schools and

libraries. They are also concerned that children spend more time playing

computer games than engaging in educational activities. However, overall

trust and support for technology presence is growing.

* The impact of IT access must be evaluated. Although roundtable

participants generally agreed on the need for meaningful evaluation tools,

they were also keenly aware of the difficulty in developing those tools.

Participants raised more questions than answers about how effective

technology can be for educational purposes. Merely counting the number and

identifying the interest levels of people who use computers is no longer

considered an adequate way to determine whether education, life and work

skills actually have been developed.

* Schools, libraries and community centers represent three primary public

access points. These three access points are similar in many ways, however

each has unique features. For instance, public schools can reach K-12

students almost every day. Libraries and community centers can serve a

broader range of age and ethnic groups, and adjust hours of access more

easily than schools can.

Moving ahead with Digital Steppingstones Project

The Digital Steppingstones Project is designed to inform policy makers and

others on how to bring equitable access to information technology to

under-served, low-income minority communities. TRPI researchers are

currently engaged in the last stage of the study that focuses on a wider

array of program strategies. TRPI will identify exemplary programs that can

serve as models. The project will also formulate policy and research

recommendations. Overall findings from the three-year project will be

disseminated through a series of activities in the year 2000, including a

final report, production of a video, an effort to highlight exemplary

programs, and a series of national and community-based events. A national

conference in Washington DC will take place in spring 2000 and will address

how our nation can work together to mend the growing gap between the "info

rich" and the "info poor."

TRPI will continue to share the information it gathers from the Digital

Steppingstones Project through its website. Upcoming policy notes will

include information on the use of information technologies in libraries,

schools and community centers.

* * *

Paula Y. Bagasao is TRPI's director for information technology research.

Elsa Macias is senior research associate and Sara Jones is

researchassistant. Harry P. Pachon is president of TRPI. Funding for this

three-year information technology research project, Digital Steppingstones,

is provided by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation. For more information on this

project check out the TRPI website at www.trpi.org.

Tomás Rivera Policy Institute

e-mail: info@trpi.org

***************************

Telematics for African Development Consortium

P.O. Box 31822

Braamfontein

2017

Johannesburg

South Africa

Tel: +27 +11 403-2813

Fax: +27 +11 403-2814

neilshel@icon.co.za

www.saide.org.za

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