ICT for Rural Economic Development

FROM 24 NOVEMBER TO 1 DECEMBER 2010

Is it possible to effectively analyze the socio-economic impact of ICT in rural areas? Following the successful face-to-face conference on "ICT for Rural Economic Development" held in Berlin, GTZ and partners are hosting this special outputs discussion for all e-Agriculture members. Organized by GTZ on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), with special subject experts and facilitators, e-Agriculture members are encouraged to share their insights on the socio-economic impact of ICT in rural areas, methods for analysis, and how to make this information widely accessible and available.

Watch this short video made during the Berlin conference with Jenny Aker (Tufts Univ.), Salome Ganibe (Asian Women in Co-operative Development Forum) and Arafat Hossain (Katalyst Bangladesh) talking about the role of impact in ICT4D work.

The face-to-face conference held last week in Berlin included participation from FAO, UNCTAD, InfoDev, CTO, BMZ, BMELV, BMWi, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland, DFID, GTZ, DED, KfW, InWent, Tufts University, Fraunhofer, University of Siegen, Royal Holloway, IICD, Kabissa, LinkNet Zambia, Kiwanja.net, GSMA, BITKOM, SAP, NSN, Manobi, MicroBanker, Detecon, Intelecon, BIID, and others. Representatives from these organizations will also be participating in this special follow-up online forum.

All e-Agriculture Members are invited to participate. To do so, log in and join the forum today. The outputs of the forum will be presented at the global ICTD2010 Conference to be held in the United Kingdom in December 2010, where GTZ, FAO and other partners will bring forward the recommendations from Conference experts, practitioners and other members of e-Agriculture Community. To review the full list of topics and discussion groups, you can access the agenda and presentations at http://ict.ez-blogs.de/

Below are the inputs of the Berlin conference from Jenny Akers (Tufts University), Arafat Hossain (Katalyst Bangladesh), Roxanna Samii (IFAD), and the keynote presentations of Anton Mangstl (FAO) and Valerie D’Costa (InfoDev) that feature as the foundation of this online forum.

Click here to go to the online discussion

During the conference “ICT for Rural Economic Development” in Berlin last week, one major issue that came out as needing further discussion is the systematization of impact assessments of ICT4D projects in rural areas. Notably, Susanne Dorasil (BMZ) and Anton Mangstl (FAO), emphasized the importance of reliable impact analyses.

Two presentations were dedicated specifically to this topic: those of Jenny Aker (Tufts University) and of Arafat Hossain (Katalyst Bangladesh). Arafat pointed out how integrating monitoring and impact evaluation measures into projects right from the start can have a positive influence on the very design of such projects. According to him, monitoring should not only be seen as a reporting tool but as an instrument for project management. Jenny highlighted the challenges of measuring the impact of ICT-based projects and presented some best practice examples. She will tell you more herself as she will contribute as a subject matter expert to the online forum.

What exactly is the value of analyzing the impact of ICT in rural areas, and on what basis should such an assessment be conducted? How can we ensure that the information about such analyses will be fed back into the design of future projects? To answer these questions, we invite you all to participate in this online forum and to share your thoughts and experience with us.