10-Sep-2009 to 11-Sep-2009. Paris. Information communication technologies (ICTs) are crucial to reducing poverty, improving access to health and education services and creating new sources of income and employment for the poor. But there are substantial discrepancies in access to ICTs between, but also within, countries, depending on key factors such as gender, rural coverage, skills and educational levels. This workshop, organised jointly by the World Bank/infoDev and the OECD, aimed to share best practices in coherent approaches to meeting development objectives laid out by Ministers.
ICT4D – the application of information and communication technologies for international development – is moving to a new phase. This will require new technologies, new approaches to innovation and implementation, new intellectual perspectives and, above all, a new view of the world's poor. All these must be understood if we are to harness digital technologies in the service of some of our world's most pressing problems.
References:
- Opening Session:
The ICT4D 2.0 Manifesto: Where Next for ICTs and International Development? 2009 (pdf). This paper explains the phase change – from "ICT4D 1.0" to "ICT4D 2.0" – and its implications. Written by Richard Heeks. - OECD Workshop on Policy Coherence in the Application of Information and Communication Technologies for Development
