Originally posted on the GBI Portal – Page 58

Ecuador: eAgri Fairtade Banana Farmers Digitalize

Photography by Glenn Edwards

Ecuadorian banana Fairtrade association La Asociación de Pequeños Productores Bananeros (APPBG) has recognized the potential of going digital.

In Ecuador, the association has received computers and training from Computer Aid to help improve farmers access to the marketplace and improve IT literacy to boost rural livelihoods.

APPBG in el Guabo, is one of the largest Fairtrade associations in Ecuador’s rural El Oro region. With a membership of over 450 small to medium sized banana producers, APPBG export 50,000 boxes of bananas a week, which are then exported to Europe.

Producers who sell through APPBG cooperative are guaranteed a stable price, which covers the cost of production when market prices go down. As a Fairtrade Labeling Organisation (FLO) approved body, APPBG provides an equitable platform from which to trade in international markets. The association also encourages consumers to make ethical considerations when purchasing imported products. FLOs are able to issue the Fairtrade logo, which is now recognized around the world as a guarantee that producers have received a fair price for their goods.

In addition to guaranteed prices for their produce, members also benefit from the association’s social projects. The computers are being used to strengthen Trade Union activity in a country with limited enforcement of worker’s rights and are also being used to improve day-to-day operations within this fast growing enterprise.

Close to Ecuador’s southern boarder, APPBG has established a network of 17 primary schools for the families of its producers. Indigenous children in these schools are now using PCs donated to provide them with the opportunity to become ICT literate.

The integration of ICTs into the APPBG association’s will help streamline their accessibility to the marketplace and the training will help sustain their efforts.

April 11, 2011/by actualize

Economic Growth & Trade, Enterprise Development, MicroEnterprise Development, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

The Future of BPO: “Cherry Blossoming,” “Gold Farming,” and “Microwork”?

Usually our discussions of ICT and economic growth follow a familiar narrative: how can we use ICTs to more efficiently perform economic tasks? We take this line of discussion because we know that efficiency is productivity, and productivity improvements lead to economic growth.

But a recent book published by the World Bank, called “Knowledge Map of the Virtual Economy,” suggests that this line of thought is boxing us in. Instead, it argues, we should ask “what completely new markets have been created by ICT growth, and how can poor people lead the way in these new industries?” If this sounds fanciful consider the following: last year a man in California paid $500 in an online auction for a “virtual” castle. We are not talking about a crumbling, stone-and-mortar, historical relic here; but rather a few lines of code that generate a castle that the buyer can use as a base for his virtual armies in an online video game. He bought this castle from a company in China that creates (and speculates in) these types of virtual products. This Chinese company employs young people, mostly male, from lower class or working class backgrounds. The workers have a decent education but little opportunity, and they are making a healthy living in a completely new industry that offers returns too low to seriously interest anyone in the developed world. But for them it’s a gold mine.

Or rather it’s a “gold farm,” which is the term that has come into use to describe these types of companies (the industry as a whole is known as “gold farming”). Gold farming was a $3 billion industry globally in 2010, and generated jobs for 100,000 full time equivalent workers. But, of the new opportunities identified by the report it is the most demanding of its workers. Other new industries can employ people with less-advanced skill sets.

One of these is called “Cherry Blossoming.” Derived from a Japanese-language slang expression (“Sakura” in Japanese means both “cherry blossom” and “paid spectator”) the name refers to an industry that sells social media “status” to companies looking to use these tools as part of their marketing strategy. For example, a company that has just started a Twitter feed may not want to go through a growth period where they have only a few followers, for fear that this low number will reflect poorly on their product or business. So “cherry blossoming” firms offer these companies the opportunity to buy Twitter followers, by the thousands. Similarly, they sell “Facebook likes.”

This business involves a large number of extremely small tasks that each generate a very low return for the company. A worker will sit at a terminal and, using a host of different profiles and accounts, “like” or “follow” their client companies. Each “like” may only take a few moments, and earn the company only a few cents. For example, a quick Google search will reveal that it is possible to buy 1000 Twitter followers for $20. This type of repetitive, low-margin work does not interest developed world companies, but in the developing world it can offer reliable income to poorly educated people who don’t have any other opportunities.

Though Cherry Blossoming is controversial, it is representative of the emerging field of “microwork,” which on the whole is not. Microwork is usually defined as a task that takes under 30 seconds to complete. Companies throughout the world have lots of this work to do, and it is now possible to parse tasks out and have them done by the very poor in the developing world.

Samasource, a non-profit organization focused on generating employment opportunities in Kenya, is one organziation that does this. They contract with large firms, in this case Silicon Valley tech firms, and perform microtask after microtask out of large telecenters the organization sets up in Africa. The group’s first contract involved digitizing text. This is often difficult for a computer to do, and near impossible if the document to be digitized is handwritten. So Samasource workers will look at scanned copies of the document and manually type in words that the software cannot comprehend. This does not even require the worker to be literate – they just need to be able to recognize all the letters by shape and match them to the keyboard. Samasource has expanded into other small tasks as well, such as vetting sites for inappropriate images and video, and verifying business listings for crowd-sourced yellow-pages sites.

Performing these micro-tasks gives “dignified digital work” to poor people, as Samasource puts it. They have even managed to set up and operate a successful business that employs many people in a refugee camp in Dadaab, on the Kenya-Somalia border.

The next iteration of micro-task work is to find a way to do it on mobile phones. The industry isn’t quite there yet, but once it is there will be no geographic limit to who can easily make a living out of the digital economy. This is the next generation of business process outsourcing, and it holds the potential to employ many poor and at-risk youth in the developing world.

If this discussion gives you any ideas, you may want to try to develop them. The World Bank is considering holding a “Mobile Micro-work Challenge,” where they would fund promising start-ups in the field.

April 8, 2011/by actualize

Asia, Connectivity, Democracy & Governance, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Where we work

Connectivity and Governance: World Bank ICT Days 2011

What role should governments play in leading their citizens down the path to become actively engaged in the knowledge society? It varies greatly on the availability, motivations, and agenda behind the corresponding country’s use of ICTs.

Last week, the World Bank held the highly anticipated four ICT Days, which explored the multifaceted functions of ICTs and how governments can use them to, “Innovate, Connect and Transform” civil society in developing nations.

During the “Connectivity Infrastructure Day”, two speakers from different regions discussed their country’s distinctive agendas and how their government’s involvement of ICTs is enveloped within their economic development reforms.

While Korea Telecom’s (KT) Vice President, Dr. Hansuk Kim, discussed the prospects of nation wide interconnectivity in Rwanda; India’s Ministry of Communication and IT Secretary, Shankar Aggarwal, unveiled his country’s e-government initiatives.

In 2008, KT made a US$40 million deal to collaborate with Rwanda’s government to construct a national backbone project expected to connect the country on a fiber-optic network. The contract obliges KT to provide the government with technology, equipment, relevant application materials and training and to manage the cable installation process. KT will also install a wireless broadband network that will be accessible to 10,000 people in Kigali.

Dr. Kim discussed how Rwanda’s proximity to other African countries, such as Burundi, Tanzania, and the Congo, can serve as a potential customer base. In the future, these countries could use Rwanda’s backbone infrastructure to serve as interconnect points.

Kim also argued that a top-down approach is necessary for large-scale investments in developing economies. He states that the supplier should be on location, and relying solely on private investment can result in fragmented connectivity, so “the government had to initiate the development cycle by giving it a jumpstart. It (the connectivity) has to start somewhere.” Please view the video below to see his argument against the common notion that a government subsidized infrastructure, would inadvertently produce a government owned monopoly:

Once completed, Rwanda’s national backbone will possess the capability to enable online activities requiring high speed, broadband Internet. This includes initiating e-government services, to integrate citizens in the governing processes, similar to the e-government proposal that India has been working on for some time.

Shankar Aggarwal, secretary of the Ministry of Communications and IT in India, spoke at the World Bank event about this new e-governance initiative by the government to make public services, and governance regulations, more inclusive and transparent.

India is a country that has experienced monumental economic growth in the last 5 years—but the distribution of wealth to its 1.2 billion residents remains extremely imbalanced. 70% of the total population lives in rural areas and survive off less than a dollar a day.

India is at a crossroads in their development, as aspirations and hopes increase, those left behind are no longer content to live out the remainder of their lives in poverty. E-governance presents the opportunity to include these individuals in the governance process.

Aggarwal noted that India’s growth will be harnessed without involving the rural poor in governing their country, “if we want to have a sustainable growth, if we want to have happy societies, we have to go in to an inclusive growth…where each and every resident of that country feels that they are part of the governance process”. He began his speech by arguing that the catalyst for the current protests in the Middle East were societies are not being inclusive of citizens in their governing processes.

Please view the following video where he discusses the future of India’s e-governance initiatives for citizen’s inclusion.

The role of these governments to actively expand their connectivity and infrastructure is one that has a common goal: to include their citizens in the knowledge society. Whether it is using public funds for a start up backbone infrastructure, or creating an e-government initiative to make government processes more inclusive, governments from around the world are channeling into the benefits of being interconnected.

April 7, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Health, Health Systems, Infectious Diseases, Mobile, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Cell Phone Attachment Helps/Manages Malaria

Today is World Health Day 2011 and theme this year is on antimicrobial resistance. In developing countries, one of the most pressing health issues is malaria, with a high morbidity and mortality rate. Rapid diagnosis and prompt treatment are most basic managerial elements on how to circumvent this vicious disease. The attachment of a microscope onto a cell phone, known as Cellscope, can help with these diagnoses.

View the Prezi below to see how the innovative mHealth tool can help rural health workers.

Copy of CellScope Story on Prezi

April 7, 2011/by actualize

GBI Highlights, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

2011 Graduate Summer Internship

GBI is please to announce the 2011 GBI Graduate Summer Internship Program! The 12 week program provides a unique opportunity for graduate students in both International Development and Communications to gain valuable insight and experience in USAID’s ICT4D activities. This unique and highly competitive program will team approximately six interns together to conduct sector research and analysis, provide text and multimedia content to the GBI Portal, assist in marketing and outreach of the portal and GBI services, and develop institutional capacity for sector specific outreach.

Dates: May 31-August 12 (12 weeks)

Location: Washington, DC (McPherson Square)

Stipend: $1500

Positions: ICT4D Research & Outreach Associate and Web and Multimedia Production Associate

~~Applications are accepted on a rolling basis. Please pass along to your networks!~~

Applications are no longer being accepted.

April 1, 2011/by actualize

Economic Growth & Trade, Economic Policy and Governance, Enterprise Development, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Reexamining India – Part II

When we last examined the Indian IT boom on this blog we were left with a few important conclusions. First, it became clear that the IT boom was driven by software exports and that these exports grew linearly until 1992. In that year something happened in the industry and software exports began to take off in an exponential manner.

Knowing that the primary input into software is labor, and that the rate of employment growth didn’t change dramatically, we can be certain that this take off in software exports was caused by massive increases in labor productivity; and we have a graph to show it. The figure below shows revenues per worker in the software industry over the course of the 1990s.

The takeoff is extraordinary. By the late 1990s software firms were hiring as many engineers as they could find, and each additional worker was leading to even higher marginal revenues. Shockingly, despite the huge IT workforce that was a precursor to the boom in the first place, by the end of the decade the number one complaint of IT firms in business surveys was a scarcity of labor.

The boom in labor productivity could only have come from two sources: better management practices and moving up the value chain (and it in fact came from both). India already had highly trained workers, and these workers were already working with advanced machinery. They were however engaged in simple work conducted “on-site” – mostly systems design, analysis and coding. There were few, if any, Indian firms doing turnkey software projects. By the early 2000s that fact had changed completely. Whereas in 1988 90% of all software exports were “on-site” services, by 2003 that number was down to 40% and falling.

What happened to allow India to move up the software value chain and to force firms to invest heavily in improved management practices? The logical place to start looking for clues is in the massive political change that occurred in India in 1991. In the 1950’s Nehru had established a Soviet-style system of central planning and restrictions on the private sector that came to be known as the “License Raj.” But in ’91, facing a currency crisis that required IMF intervention, the international community forced reforms on India that made it much easier for businesses to spring up and foreign investment to pour in. And pour in it did: the graph below shows foreign investment into India throughout the 1990s. Its exponential shape seems to mirror that of software exports.

But of course the story isn’t quite that simple. While the 1992-99 period did see 68 multinational software firms establish offices in the country, software exports have always been largely the domain of domestic firms. By 2001 multinationals still accounted for only 15% of such exports from India.

It is also important to note that in 1990 and 1991 the government established a series of software technology parks (STPs). The first one opened in Bangalore in August 1990 and included modern communications networks that were beyond the reach of ordinary firms. Even after liberalization the government continued to do this, and by 2002 there were 39 parks that together accounted for 80% of the country’s software exports.

So we have a lot of different elements – some involving liberalization and some involving outright subsidization – that were woven together to create a unique growth recipe for IT in India. The story can be told briefly somewhat like this.

In the mid-1980s, while Indian IT was almost entirely focused on on-site services, Texas Instruments came in and established a research and development center in Bangalore. The exact reasons they were willing to go through the trouble of starting a subsidiary in India during the License Raj years are unknown, but the fact that they had an IIT-educated Indian VP may well have had something to do with it. Many of their multinational competitors watched from afar as this business was set up, but none followed. Bangalore at the time TI arrived was a hub of the Indian defense industry, home of an IIT, and a logical place for the government to establish a science and technology park. They did so largely at the urging of the software exporters specializing in “on-site” software development. They felt that with better data links to their work sites (links they couldn’t afford on their own) they would be better able to do more of their work in India. That would save them a large amount of money in both travel and in the division of labor. Often consultants that went out from India on site visits were top tier company employees – they had to be capable of the most complex tasks that clients would ask of them. But these top employees spent little of their time on the ground doing complex tasks. Often times they simply coded, a job for which software engineers in the US and Europe almost never do Pronab Sen noted that because of this phenomenon the average productivity of an Indian on-site software engineer in the US was only 30% of his American counterpart. With reliable data links the on-site consultant could farm this work out to employees at home and spend more of his time doing complex work.

By 1993 this had begun to happen. “Off-shoring,” the development of software in India, had jumped by a third over the previous two years. Consequently, the labor productivity associated with the primary industry laborers, the on-site software engineers, had begun to soar. As more and more work was done off-shore by the companies that had previously requested on-site services, they became more comfortable with it. Gradually, more and more valuable work was allowed to be off-shored.

At the same time that “on-site” consulting firms were beginning to do more offshore work India was liberalizing. The firms that had long watched Texas Instruments, and had seen them prove that successful R&D could be done in India, finally could make a business case to move into the country.

So foreign software firms began to move into India, and previously on-site clients began to do more work off-shore, all at the same time. This led to a fierce competition for the primary resource in the IT sector, programmers and engineers. But interestingly, as pointed out by the economist Suma Athreye, the Indian firms and the multinationals were only competing in the input market, not the product market. The large multinational subsidiaries established in India sold their product only to their parent company. This meant that the presence of multinational firms in India forced salaries up, forced domestic firms to adopt more efficient labor use strategies, but did not compete with (and potentially destroy) them. These positive incentives had an impact on labor productivity. By the late 1990’s Indian firms had earned ISO certifications that were on par with the multinationals with whom they were competing for talent. A culture of organizational management expertise was inaugurated, and as new Indian firms were created in throughout the 1990’s they sought this expertise as well. So it was truly a combination of moving up the value chain and improved business processes that led to the labor productivity boom, and it was brought about by a unique combination of public policies (some liberal, some not) and private sector initiative.

What lessons can we draw from this experience? I pull out a few, but am happy to debate them.

1) In India business parks were successful. I can think of many places where they were not. They worked in India because existing business had a need (connectivity) that the business park could solve. They were not meant to create an industry out of nothing.

2) A plan that relies on accessing export markets can work, but it works really well when you have limited competition and your citizens hold management positions with the primary overseas clients.

3) The entry of multinationals had a catalytic effect on growth in software exports from domestic Indian firms. This is likely because they only competed in input markets, not output markets, and because Indian firms were already well established.

I could probably go on, but a trend is emerging. It seems that standard interventions to support ICT industries – a business park, a strategy of liberalization – can go either of two ways. It can help your industry or hurt it, depending on conditions on the ground. This argues strongly for heterodox policies that are country specific and take account of these circumstances.

March 30, 2011/by actualize

Civil Society, Democracy & Governance, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Time-Lapsed Map of Global Protests and Uprisings

Two weeks ago, John Caelan of Swamppost.com created a one-and-a-half minute, time-lapse video of the major uprising and protests around the world between December 18 to March 7, 2011.

By analyzing a wide field of news sources, he argues that the map is adequately scaled, and reflects the density of reported demonstrations across a wide field of news sources. However, he does acknowledge that the video does not represent all the events of protests or uprising in the world.

The colors for the icons represent:

Red: resulting in death
Orange: major injuries, damage, arrests
Yellow: minor injuries
Green: Peaceful

The number of pickets is the size:

1: Under 100
2: 100-1000
3: 1000-10000
4. 10K – 100K
5. Over 100K.

By utilizing open media research of worldwide news sources, Caelan compiled 80 maps for each day with the events added as they are discovered, so the apparent “blossoming” of events is simply a reflection of data that is available early on. His general methodology was to filter through the first thousand results of a news search on any given day, record the event, and archive them on an Excel sheet. The information in Excel was organized by day, and then further categorized by the location of where the events occurred, which he extracted from the articles manually. The flag icons were chosen by the average of reporting, as 100% accuracy in reporting the actual count of people at any gathering is intrinsically difficult, regardless of slant that the involved media parties tend to apply. Each day’s sheet was turned into a .csv file, and imported into the mapper supplied by Zee Maps. Caelan said that each day would be copied into the Excel sheet, with new events added–events older than 5 days are deleted, and those events older than 2 days turn to gray. Each event remains in color for two days, to account for the crossover of time zones. As he built most of these in retrospect, the December and early January time frame has less of the more obscure demonstrations because they were more difficult to research.

In addition, the video below compliments the original Global Protests & Uprisings video, however, this is the time-lapse series of maps focused in on North Africa and the Middle East for the period of December 18, 2010 to March 7, 2011.

Caelan, however, is aware of the unreliability of these results in showing worldwide trends. Due to the mainstream media now actively providing coverage and following the protests, he says, this map shows how the reporting on uprisings or protests have dramatically increased. Although he does not that this does not necessarily accurately reflect the quantity of protests themselves. He comments on the website:

Before ‘protest’ came to the forefront of international lexicon, there was much less density of reporting on demonstrations, and this was the primary reason for the perceived ‘viral’ pattern of the global uprisings. Suddenly, it’s pages upon pages of search results; however, as you point out, thousands of actions go unnoticed, even more so eclipsed by the weighty mass of popular revolt than before.

To find out more information about the uprisings shown in the video where you can click on the different icons and read information on the protest that was recorded at that point in his interactive map.

March 24, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Environment, Health, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Researchers collect ‘signals intelligence’ on insect pests

Entomologist Richard Mankin examines signals collected by an inexpensive prototype system (on the bench, at his fingertips) for automated insect detection and identification.

Photo Credit: Agricultural Research Service

It may sound a little far fetched for development right now, but using off the shelf components to detect insects by sound could have some important applications in environment, health, and agriculture some day – and these days, “some day” always seems a little sooner than you would expect. This could be important for example in identifying the vector of a particularly virulent emerging infectious disease, or in early detection of and rapid response to an invasive forest or agricultural pest. File it away in the “you never know” drawer.

Researchers collect ‘signals intelligence’ on insect pests.

March 24, 2011/by actualize

Connectivity, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

BBC News – Afghan Taliban threat shuts Helmand mobile network

Here’s a good indicator of the role of ICT in development.

BBC News – Afghan Taliban threat shuts Helmand mobile network.

March 24, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Basic Education, Education, Education, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

New Toolkit helps schools establish, maintain and expand computer facilities

Across the world, governments, donors, private companies, parents and schools are establishing computer facilities and connecting them to the Internet in an effort to improve education. Although well intentioned, a common result of these efforts is the challenge schools have in keeping their computers running, covering increased costs for electricity, paying for Internet connectivity and integrating the use of computers into the curriculum.

The Computer System Sustainability Toolkit is designed to help staff, students and parents at schools gain the skills needed to develop and implement plans to establish and/or sustain their computer systems. The Toolkit is written so that members of the school and community can create and implement their plans without additional external support.

Does this Toolkit work? Can computer facilities at schools really become self-sustaining entities? Can schools really generate sufficient income from their facilities to keep their systems running, to buy new equipment, and to build the capacity of their staff to use the computers? Can schools really learn to integrate the use of their computers across their curriculum? And can they do all this on their own?

The short answer to these questions, at least according to the initial evidence, is YES!

The content from the Toolkit was first used with the staff and students at five rural schools in Southern Sumatra as part of a small project that was funded by Qualcomm Wireless Reach. Before this effort, most of the computers that had been installed at these schools a year earlier were not working, the schools were no longer connected to the Internet and the IT teachers were the only teachers at these schools who were using the computers with students. Now, three years later, all the computers at these schools are fully functioning, the labs are well maintained, most teachers at these schools now use the labs with their students and each school has a well established Student Support Technicians Club (SSTC). And all this has been done with funds generated through the use of their computer facilities.

Digital copies of the toolkit in color and grayscale, along with a variety of tools and templates can be downloaded online at: http://aed.org/Publications/computer-system-sustainability-toolkit.cfm

March 23, 2011/by actualize

Case Studies

Contact Details

Quick Links

About

Expertise

Impact

Join

Sign up for Updates