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Our
Programmes Target MDGs No. 1 & 8
UNDERSTANDING AN ICT RESEARCH &
RESOURCE CENTRE:
A resource centre
is a collection of classified information. An
ICT Resource Centre organises information on
both hardware and software materials. These
materials may be very varied, including training
manuals, handbooks, reference books,
directories, leaflets, posters, CDs, videos and
other samples of equipment.
Information plays
an important part in the wider learning process
– helping community development workers to
understand the context of their work, follow new
approaches, undertake new responsibilities,
improve their practice and remind them of basic
concepts. However, there is too much information
on market currently, which has resulted into
what is called Information Overload. This
information needs to be filtered and stored in
an accessible collection place in order to meet
specific needs of such development groups of
people in a society.
Learning takes
place not only at workshops or on training
courses, but also through discussions with
colleagues, practical experience, and consulting
newsletters, books and audiovisual materials. An
ICT Resource centre can support a wide range of
learning activities by making information
available. By helping community development
workers learn, they can play a valuable part in
improving the socio-economic and political
structures of a community and nation.
The rapid growth
of modern Information and Communication
Technologies around the globe requires every
developing community to integrate ICTs in her
development strategies. A concern for equity –
a key principle required for any developing
society – means that information, like health
care, should be accessible to all. Therefore, in
order to realise real impact of increasing ICTs,
there should be real access by all. But in many
developing societies, for example, the Toro
region of western Uganda, access to information
is limited, especially modern ICT supported
information that is relevant to local
conditions. Locally produced information is
often unavailable to the grassroots, mainly the
youth, while information produced outside the
Toro region community may be inappropriate with
out a clear understanding of what goes on in the
local environment or too expensive to access.
Another challenge
is that effective access and use of modern ICT
facilities that enhance easy flow of information
in Toro region must be appropriate to local
needs and conditions. Appropriateness can be
gauged in terms of power requirements, security,
environmental conditions, and other aspects of
the local situation, like income levels of the
population to own ICT equipment that include
computers, Internet connectivity, radios and so
on.
An ICT Resource
centre in Fort Portal town, as a public access
point, will have an important part to play in
improving easy access and use of relevant and
timely information for the socio-economic and
political development of the young people, who
are limited by many local conditions to own
individual modern information accessibility
equipment in the Toro region and the whole
Ugandan society.
An ICT Resource
centre will be much more than a collection of
well-organised materials. A resource centre will
actively seek to share the information that it
will contain. Resource centre staff will
encourage people to seek and use materials
beyond the Resource Centre premises. For
example, they will not only help people to find
materials that they need within the centre, but
also disseminate information outside the
resource centre, by producing and distributing
locally adapted materials and information packs,
holding trainings or discussion workshops,
conferences, arranging exhibitions and holding
radio talk shows tackling substantive subject
matters on two local radio stations in Kyenjojo
and Fort Portal towns.
WHO NEEDS INFORMATION IN TORO REGION?
By the end of
ToroDev base-line study in December 2005, the
following categories of people were considered
to be in critical need of information in the
Toro region of western Uganda;
Community
development workers and educators, Non
governmental organisations, local governments,
researchers, opinion formers and leaders, self
help groups, the youth in particular, student
interns, donors and other community partners all
need information. There is plenty of evidence
that access to the right information at the
right time, can enable these groups make a
difference in the improvement of social,
economic living conditions of the people of Toro
region, especially the young people between the
ages of eighteen and thirty years, with emphasis
on providing equal share of opportunities of
these improvements between men and women.
Central
government development structural reforms,
changing socio-economic and political
development patterns at community level vis a
vis advances in modern Information technology at
international levels make it vitally important
that everyone involved in social, economic and
political research and promotion has access to
relevant information – not only during their
initial training, but throughout their working
lives, to enable them keep up-to-date and
develop their skills.
Community development workers and
educators
These need basic
data on the profile of the local area, the
latest techniques employed in community
development of Toro, how the specific population
groups, for example, the youth and women, have
been involved, how to work with other government
sectors such as health, education, environment
or poverty eradication programmes, ideas on how
to undertake self help projects, and,
increasingly, good information flow linkage with
donors and other partners.
Non-governmental
organisations like Engabu Za Tooro (EZT)
and Kabarole Research Centre (KRC
that have been involved in community work in the
Toro Region for a long time need an ICT
infrastructure to promote their research and
dissemination of results to the grassroots,
especially the young people between eighteen and
thirty years, become more aware of and
participate in national and international
initiatives, and keep abreast of issues and
approaches in their sector (s) of concern.
Through a wireless Local Area Network that a
resource centre plans to establish, there will
be an easy flow of information amongst the main
NGOs and CBOs in Fort Portal town, leading to
improved realisation of their core competencies,
and link other CBOs to potential funders of the
activities they are involved in the community at
national and international levels.
Researchers and student Interns
Researchers need
factual information on the area they are
researching, and they need to know what research
is being carried out, or has been completed and
the results, in order to ensure that they are
not duplicating any work. An ICT Resource Centre
in Fort Portal will provide that facility to
ensure promotion of research activities in the
region focused on specific subject matters of
social, economic and political development.
Opinion formers (Professionals) and
leaders
Opinion formers
who include professionals in Information
Technology, Health, Education and Economics, to
mention but a few, require accurate and reliable
information on community performance and needs
in order to form public opinions on specific
issues, for example, on taxation, market access
for small-scale producers, health and education
promotion that are of public concern. An ICT
Resource Centre will provide materials that
justify such opinions. Policy makers (opinion
leaders) always require concrete data on which
public opinions have been formed in order to
make policies. They also need information on
marginalised groups like the youth, women and
the disabled in order to determine resource
allocations. All this information will be
provided at the resource centre.
Small-scale entrepreneurs
These need to
learn how to participate in planning,
implementing and evaluating their projects,
promote community involvement in development
efforts, campaign for better services, promote
their own services, and learn about their rights
through the access of reliable information from
a reliable source such as a resource centre.
Donors and general public
The donors need
measurable results (preferably positive results)
from the beneficiaries of their support. They
can get such information from a public access
point by just logging onto a resource centre
website located in Fort Portal town and get
information about the performance and impact of
beneficiaries in the Toro region. The public
also requires information in order to keep up to
date on certain issues like politics, consumer
product prices and so on. An ICT Resource Centre
will provide all that information.
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NETWORK
