Even with the phenomenon of information and telecommunication revolution worldwide, a considerable number of people still remain untouched by its impact. While internet connectivity is becoming commonplace to many ordinary people in Europe and North America, a huge number of people in the poorer parts of the world are yet to make their first telephone call.
The government of Finland’s 2004 Development Policy Programme sets out the use of ICT in fighting poverty as well as help bridge the digital divide as a central goal in its development co-operation. The issue is not bridging the divide per se; it has now been recognized that ICT has enormous development potentials, and can be harnessed to achieve crucial development goals such as poverty reduction, education and improving the health situation of people in developing countries.
But how can this be realised in practice? The Ministry for Foreign Affairs attempts to provide an answer by issuing a government’s policy guidelines in a hitherto unknown territory, the application of ICT in development co-operation. The core element is concerned with mainstreaming ICT into all sectors of development policy: “(…) Finland’s information society -based development policy should be holistic as well as consistent with the developing of society’s institutions, civil society and the private sector. These principles will be achieved by integrating ICT and other factors connected with information society, and issues connected with welfare such as human capacity, education, public administration, healthcare, environment and development of the economic sectors.”
However, this requires an examination of each sector’s special nature and requirements in order to identify where ICT can be applied to resolve problems. Jyrki Pulkkinen, sector adviser in the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and main author of the guidelines points out that mainstreaming ICT into the various policy sectors is bound to encounter bottlenecks, therefore the first step is to identify and fix them. He notes that critics might contend mainstreaming ICT in developing countries is an almost impossible task because every sector of society is fraught with numerous bottlenecks which cannot be eliminated. But he counters this by arguing that development is precisely concerned with overcoming those problems in society that appear insurmountable.
The basis for sustainable information society has to be created holistically in the partner country by taking account of broad capacities of the people, legislation strategies, and the needed infrastructure. Human capacity, i.e. know-how is the fundamental factor in all development questions. “The digital divide is not only about infrastructure, it is also about information, knowledge, and education”, says Pulkkinen.
As in development co-operation in general, the guidelines do also recognise that the need for ICT should come from the developing countries and not be imposed on them. In that connection ICT-based project initiatives in different sectors should come from the development co-operating partners, for instance poverty reduction strategy plans (PRSPs) and based on that Finland can then enter into constructive dialogue on how to move the process forward.
The need for private sector involvement is given emphasis throughout the guidelines, underscoring the important role of private capital since governments cannot all go it alone. As Pulkkinen points out, it is the private sector that has the bulk of investment and the responsibility of governments to provide the condusive atmosphere in order to attract private companies into the developing countries.
Text by Linus Atarah
Development policy guidelines
concerning the Information Society and information and communications technology
http://global.finland.fi/tietoyhteiskunta/ict_guidelines2005.pdf
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