- transparency and accountability as core values
- better coordination and program planning (internally and externally)
- reduced reporting burden (if donors agree to use IATI as a common tool)
- improved aid effectiveness
- collective learning in the aid sector
- improved legitimacy for aid agencies
- an opportunity to educate the donor public on how aid/development really works
- ‘moral ground’ for IATI compliant aid organizations to pressure governments and private sector to be more transparent
- space for communities and ‘beneficiaries’ to hold aid agencies more accountable for their work
- space for engaging communities and the public in identifying what information about aid is useful to them
- concrete ways for communities to contest, validate and discuss aid information, intentions, budgets, actions, results.
- Is IATI the right way to achieve the goal of transparency and accountability?
- Is the cost in time, money, systems, and potential risk of exposure worth the individual and collective gain?
- Is IATI the flavor of the month, to be replaced in 2-4 years?
- What is the burden for staff? Will it increase overhead? Will it take funds and efforts away from programs on the ground?
- What is the position of the US Government/USAID? Will implementing agencies have to report in yet another format (financial, narrative)?
- Much internal project documentation at NGOs/INGOs has not been written with the idea of it being published. There may be confidential information or poorly written internal documents. How will aid agencies manage this?
- What if other agencies ‘steal’ ideas, approaches or donors?
- What security/risks might be caused for sexual or political minority groups or vulnerable groups if activities are openly published?
- Isn’t IATI too focused on ‘upward’ accountability to donors and tax payers? How will it improve accountability to local program participants and ’beneficiaries’? How can we improve and mandate feedback loops for participants in the same way we are doing for donors?
- Does IATI offer ‘supplied data’ rather than offer a response to data demands from different sectors?
- technology’s impact on donor-sponsored technical assistance delivery, and
- private enterprise driven economic development, facilitated by technology.
Our meetings are lively conversations, not boring presentations – PowerPoint is banned and attendance is capped at 15 people – and frank participation with ideas, opinions, and predictions is actively encouraged through our key attributes. The Technology Salon is sponsored by Inveneo and a consortium of sponsors as a way to increase the discussion and dissemination of information and communication technology’s role in expanding solutions to long-standing international development challenges.
Does ‘openness’ enhance development?
This was the question explored in a packed Room 3 (and via livestream and Twitter) on the last day of the ICTD2012 Conference in Atlanta, GA.
Panelists included Matthew Smith from the International Development Research Center (IDRC), Soren Gigler from the World Bank, Varun Arora from the Open Curriculum Project and Ineke Buskens from Gender Research in Africa into ICTs for Empowerment (GRACE). The panel was organized by Tony Roberts and Caitlin Bentley, both pursuing PhD’s at ICT4D at Royal Holloway, University of London. I was involved as moderator.
As background for the session, Caitlin set up a wiki where we all contributed thoughts and ideas on the general topic.
“Open development” (sometimes referred to as “Open ICT4D“) is defined as:
“an emerging area of knowledge and practice that has converged around the idea that the opening up of information (e.g. open data), processes (e.g. crowdsourcing) and intellectual property (e.g. open source) has the potential to enhance development.”
Tony started off the session explaining that we’d come together as people interested in exploring the theoretical concepts and the realities of open development and probing some of the tensions therein. The wiki does a good job of outlining the different areas and tension points, and giving some background, additional links and resources.
[If you’re too short on time or attention to read this post, see the Storify version here.]
Matthew opened the panel giving an overview of ‘open development,’ including 3 key areas: open government, open access and open means of production. He noted that ICTs can be enablers of these and that within the concept of ‘openness’ we also can find a tendency towards sharing and collaborating. Matthew’s aspiration for open development is to see more experimentation and institutional incentives towards openness. Openness is not an end unto itself, but an element leading to better development outcomes.
Soren spoke second, noting that development is broken, there is a role for innovation in fixing it, and ‘open’ can contribute to that. Open is about people, not ICTs, he emphasized. It’s about inclusion, results and development outcomes. To help ensure that what is open is also inclusive, civil society can play an ‘infomediary‘ role between open data and citizens. Collaboration is important in open development, including co-creation and partnership with a variety of stakeholders. Soren gave examples of open development efforts including Open Aid Partnership; Open Data Initiative; and Kenya Open Government Portal.
Varun followed, with a focus on open educational resources (OER), asking how ordinary people benefit from “open”. He noted that more OER does not necessarily lead to better educational outcomes. Open resources produced in, say, the US are not necessarily culturally appropriate for use in other places. Open does not mean unbiased. Open can also mean that locally produced educational resources do not flourish. Varun noted that creative commons licenses that restrict to “non-commercial” use can demotivate local entrepreneurship. He also commented that resources like those from Khan Academy assume that end users have a computer in their home and a broadband connection.
Ineke spoke next, noting that ‘open’ doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Sometimes power relations become more apparent when things become open. She gave the example of a project that offered free computer use in a community, yet men dominated the computers, computers were available during hours when women could not take advantage of them, and women were physically pushed away from using the computers. ‘This only has to happen once or twice before all the women in the community get the message,’ she noted. The intent behind ‘open’ is important, and it’s difficult to equalize the playing field in one small area when working within a broader context that is not open and equalized. She spoke of openness as performance, and emphasized the importance of thinking through the questions: openness for whom? openness for what?
[Each of the presenters holds a wealth of knowledge on this topic and I’d encourage you to explore their work in more detail!]
Following the short comments from panelists, the room split into several groups for about 15 minutes to discuss points, tensions, and questions on the concept of open development. (See the bottom of the wiki page for the full list of questions.)
We came back together in plenary to discuss points from the room and those coming in from Twitter, including:
- Should any research done with public funds be publicly open and available? This was a fundamental values question for some.
- Can something be open and not public? Some said that no, if it’s open it needs to be public. Others countered that there is some information that should not be public because it can put people at risk or invade privacy. Others discussed that open goods are not necessarily public goods, rather they are “club” goods that are only open to certain members of society, in this case, those of a certain economic and education level. It was noted that public access does not equal universal availability, and we need to go beyond access in this discussion.
- Is openness fundamentally decentralizing or does it lead to centralization? Some commented that the World Bank, for example, by making itself “open” it can dominate the development debate and silence voices that are not within that domain. Others felt that power inequalities exist whether there is open data or not. Another point of view was that the use of a particular technique can change people without it being the express intent. For example, some academic journals may have been opening up their articles from the beginning. This is probably not because they want to be ‘nice’ but because they want to keep their powerful position, however the net effect can still be positive.
- How to ensure it’s not data for data’s sake? How do we broker it? How do we translate it into knowledge? How does it lead to change? ‘A farmer in Niger doesn’t care about the country’s GDP,’ commented one participant. It’s important to hold development principles true when looking at ‘openness’. Power relations, gender inequities, local ownership, all these aspects are still something to think about and look at in the context of ‘openness’.
The general consensus was that it is important to fight the good fight, yes, but don’t lose sight of the ultimate goal. Open for whom? Open for what?
As organizers of the session, we were all quite pleased at the turnout and the animated debate and high level of interest in the topic of ‘open development’. A huge thanks to the panelists and the participants. We are hoping to continue the discussions throughout the coming months and to secure a longer session (and a larger room) for the next ICTD conference!
Note: New Tactics is discussing “Strengthening Citizen Participation in Local Governance” this week. There are some great resources there that could help to ground the discussion on ‘open development’.
Visit the ‘does openness enhance development’ wiki for a ton of resources and background on ‘open development’!
Photo credit: AgroAssist
One outcome is the AgroAssistant, a mobile app built on the Android platform. This recently piloted app will aid Rural Agricultural Development Agency (RADA) Field Officers to remotely access farmer and farm information as well as identify crop production figures and prices islandwide. So significant is the potential for the app to be used to sort copious data into meaningful bits, that Matthew McNaughton(@mamcnaughton), one of the developers, says the depth of information collected about farmers, their output trends and profiles, could revolutionize the way local banks assess the credit risk of small farmers. This is arguable a watershed moment for many engaged in the business of microcredit for agriculture, as established assets-based methods of denoting credit worthiness impedes access to capital for expansion in a region where the average farmer is on the cusp of retirement (age 45) with few assets, if any, that they can afford to risk.
The wave of enthusiasm surrounding the initial agriculture open data initiative led to the formation of SlashRoots, a pan-Caribbean developer conference and community. Though launched just last February, SlashRoots(@slash_roots) is now a leader in the Caribbean’s ICT4D and Open Data for regional development space. SlashRoots’ iconic status isn’t by chance, according to the convenors, the name is a product of the merger of two powerful tech products with a cultural twist: Slash is taken from the once premier web hub for tech savvy folks, SlashDot; and Roots doubles in honour of the super user folder on a Linux machine and a contemporary Caribbean cultural expression of pride.
At inception, SlashRoots, in collaboration with MSB and support from IDRC, held a wildly successful conference that attracted nearly 450 persons and 45 developers from across the region—even John Wonderlich of the DC-based Sunlight Foundation, a tech gov watchdog, was in attendance.
The MSB agriculture initiative is only one of several IDRC-funded projects in the Caribbean Open Institute Initiative. Others include mFisheries in Trinidad and Tobago, which is being implemented by Caribbean ICT Research Programme at the Department of Engineering, UWI St Augustine, and the technology policy work of Fundacion Taiguey in the Domincan Republic. But the region’s open data for development thrust doesn’t end there, on January 26-27, the administrators of these three projects will host the Caribbean Open Data Conference dubbed “Developing Caribbean”.
The website describes the event as “the first regional Conference and Software Developer Competition of its kind, focused on Open Data and Social development. It uniquely combines a conference with the thrill [and competitive nature of] a code sprint, with the social objectives of government, NGOs and Civil Society”. The “Developing Caribbean” event is apart of a larger open data movement in Latin America, which also included the inaugural Developing Latin America event organized by Ciudadano Inteligente, an technology NGO in Chile, on December 3rd and 4th of last year.
The Conference and Codesprint will span three countries (Jamaica, Dominican Republic and Trinidad and Tobago), with virtual sites for developers recently added in Barbados, Belize, Cuba and Guyana. Over the two days teams of developers will be building apps to solve prominent social problems in the areas of Agriculture & Fisheries, Regional Trade and Tourism. The ideas for the apps are being crowdsourced by the organizers from practitioners, NGO, government and other stakeholders to culminate with a potent combination of social expertise and technical wizardy over the two days of the conference.
Follow @DevCaribbean for details about the conference and the emerging Caribbean open data policy framework.
Photo Credit: Android Community
From Mr Tuli’s presentation yesterday at the World Bank on India’s new low-cost tablet Aakash, and the discussions that followed, I differ to agree that the device is Educational as being dubbed.
Launched in October this year by the country’s Minister for Human Resource Development, Aakash has been described by some as potentially heralding a new “Internet revolution” within India education, doing for educational computing what the mobile phone has done for personal communications over the past decade.
Through a live Webcast and twitter, the CEO of Datawind, Suneet Singh Tuli presented his case to the World Bank and his global audience on why the Aakash tablet computer will revolutionize education in India and possibly in other parts of the developing world. Mr. Tuli focused his talk on the device, affordability, connectivity or access to the Internet, content, and sustainable business models to drive broad adoption of the device in the developing world through an ecosystems approach in an event organized by the Open Data Innovations Network (ODIN) of the Bank with the key concern of what is different this time around (Listen to the recorded webcast).
In response to his talk, several questions, concerns, and comments both from the face-to-face audience and through social media were centered on content. This is because of the christening of the device as “educational”. I tend to agree with most of the comments that the device could have an educational component but education should not be the heart of the tablet. Aakash is a technological innovation and should be presented as such and left for users to decide how to use it. Using it for education in India because of the available educational content or training materials at the time does not make it an educational device.
I believe Aakash could be revolutionary in nature due to its current low cost – the actual cost of $60 or the subsidized rate of $35. The focus should be on exploring its potential within all sectors of development to facilitate communication of information. Access to information and knowledge is the driving force for development in the current information age and the knowledge society. Mobile technologies are having great impact on the developing world as a result of their unique capability to connect rural people to informational resource – health, agriculture, education, market, democracy and governance, among others. For Aakash to have any impact on any or all of these development sectors will require some kind of collaboration with Value Added Service (VAS) providers – content developers.
The CEO of Datawind also sought the support of the World Bank through its networks with national governments in the developing world to help in the adoption and use of the device to help meet the educational goal by incorporating it into their educational curriculum. But I wonder if this is the right time for such a policy action by an international development agency at this early stage of the innovation.
An interesting review of Aakash can be found here.
Nearly 150 companies and individual submissions made the shortlist for Kenya’s Tandaa Digital Content Grant. The Tandaa Digital Content Grant, a competitive campaign to unearth and finance web and mobile-phone apps developers, was unveiled last year by the Ministry of Information and Communication, through the Kenya ICT Board.
At its inception 15 grantees benefited—companies, individuals and groups of varying sizes. But this year the Kenyan government will double direct funding through grants.
The renewal of this successful initiative will see 30 awards being doled out to shortlisted candidates in varied categories. The Ministry of Information and Communication says the highly attractive Tandaa Digital Content Grant is worth up to US$50, 000 for companies, US$10, 000 for individuals and teams, plus a matching grant of US$150, 000 for established companies.
The grant is further evidence of Kenya’s bold and thoughtful ICT policy framework, which is increasingly backed by solid initiatives. It will further stimulate ICT innovation and could spur greater economic growth. ICT already account for five cents in every dollar of Kenya’s annual income. The policy is solid to the extent that it tackles the key hindrance to the expansion of Kenya’s ICT sector: financing. Companies, particularly start-ups, that specialize in web and mobile solutions face major hurdles in their quest to access funding. The risky nature of their ventures, getting innovation to market successfully, also heightens the perception of risk in financial circles.
However, the challenge of financing mobile-innovation must be tackled in a more meaningful way: a sustainable solution, not simply grants. A mixture of subsidized loans, and targeted finance for micro and medium size technology firms is necessary for a potent long-term strategy to find a toehold. Grants have a place in the overall strategy, but they are not central to the long-term financing challenge.
For further information, please go here.
