Message-ID: <0098EC8782D29A80.0000333F@tmar.com> Date: Wed, 12 Apr 1995 17:58:41 EST From: "Chuck B. at Ext. 214" <mailto:chuckb@TMAR.COM> Subject: Telecom-related posting 1, part 2 To: Multiple recipients of list DEVEL-L
Here is the rest.
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Date: Sat, 8 Apr 1995 09:23:22 EDT
Originally-From: Don Richardson <mailto:drichard@uoguelph.ca>
Subject: Africa net access - McBride Rpt
GROUP URGES BETTER INFORMATION HIGHWAY ACCESS FOR AFRICA ....
The main theme of the meeting was Africa and the Information
Superhighway, or the implications of the next generation of information
technology for this vast continent. The point of departure for discussion
was obvious: as put recently by an African diplomat to the UN General
Assembly, "While industrialised countries are already talking about an
Information Superhighway, in most of the developing countries that
highway has not been paved". There is a strong possibility that much
of the African coastline will be ringed by glass fibre cables. But, except
for some large cities, the land mass of Africa is likely be untouched by an
information highway for a long time to come. More than 70 per cent of
Africa's population live in villages with no electricity and no telephone
connections, nor are they likely to have them in the foreseeable future.
Besides, these villagers have so little spending power that they are of
little interest to the big players of the information highway.
The highway planners are interested only in Africa's affluent city
dwellers who are already in possession of a telecommunication
infrastructure, thereby further widening the gap between the rich and poor.
- Radio, the only affordable mass medium for most people, must be
extended, improved in quality and diversified in content, particularly
in its educational programmes;
- A more reliable and less expensive telephone network should be
established as a matter of urgency and gradually extended to rural
areas; an inter-African telecommunication system needs to be
developed under the auspices and with the support of the International
Telecommunications Union (ITU);
- The current problems caused by the steep increase in paper prices need
to be addressed, lest the effects on African education and book
production be catastrophic;
- An independent press committed to democratic accountability needs to
be strengthened;
- The training and education of journalists in all parts of Africa remain
an urgent and ongoing task.