Bridging Digital Divide in Cambodia
Where is the money for bridging the digital divide?
In response to Panos and Global Knowledge Partnership inviting submissions for 2005 “Reporting on the Information Society” awards, I highlight projects working to bridge digital divide in Cambodia for Cambodian journalists to take part in this competition.
Cambodia goes online
“An ambitious new project has begun to link all of Cambodia to the internet. Using $1.2m in aid money from the United States, the project’s organisers are opening community information centres in 22 provincial capitals around the country. The centres will use wireless technology to allow Cambodians to go online. One of the main ideas behind the project is to give Cambodian voters better access to information ahead of the general election in July. But there are doubts that this goal is attainable, given the technological challenges and the low standard of voter education in the country.”Internet Village Motoman
“The Internet Village Motoman project connects small villages in Ratanakiri to the Internet and e-mail communications through an innovative, yet surprisingly simple, system. p>15 solar-powered village schools, telemedicine clincs and the governor’s office have been connected to the larger world, through five bright red Honda motorcycles equipped with First Mile Solutions Mobile Access Points and a 256 Kb/s Satellite uplink. Each of the schools can send and receive email, and browse the Internet using a non-real-time search engine. Many of these villages had no previous communications infrastucture. No postal system, no telephones. Many villages can only be reached via ox-cart or motorcycle. It is a vital, first step for these villages in gaining access to much needed educational, medical and economic opportunities that they would otherwise not have.”$100 Laptop
“Kids in the developing world need the newest technology, especially really rugged hardware and innovative software. Recent work with schools in Maine has shown the huge value of using a laptop across all of one’s studies, as well as for play. Bringing the laptop home engages the family. In one Cambodian village where we have been working, there is no electricity, thus the laptop is, among other things, the brightest light source in the home.”Ingenious Efforts Widen Road to Information
“Every morning, ‘motomen’ aboard donated motorcycles with Wi-Fi-equipped boxes ply five different routes around the province, starting from the central hub located at the Ezra Vogel School behind the provincial hospital in Banlung to collect e-mail from the satellite dish.”New Internet-Enabled Information Centers Open Across Cambodia
“The Asia Foundation, a leading non-governmental organization active in Asia since 1954, is launching an innovative new project that will bring access to information and communication to every Cambodian province, through a network of 22 Community Information Centers (CICs). The core of each CIC will be an information and communication technology unit that will provide Internet access, email, and other computer-based services to the local community, as well as access to a new, first-of-its-kind local language web portal. The Community Information Centers will provide a public space for the local community to access news and information, communicate with people outside of their community, and hold discussions via the Internet for the first time. Financial support for the project is being provided by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).”Cambodians share in the digital economy
“One of many casualties of Cambodia’s civil war, San Kolap needs a crutch to walk with a heavy limp. When she was one-year-old, she was permanently maimed by a rocket that hit her family’s home. That left her with bleak prospects in Cambodia’s dismal economy. Labour officials observe that the disabled are the poorest of the poor in the south-east Asian nation, and usually excluded from society. “[When I was younger] I thought I didn’t want to live in the world,” said Ms Kolap, now 23. “When I went outside I was afraid of people.”‘
Technorati Tag: Cambodia, Khmer, Digital Divide
