Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Ethiopia's Dreamland
I found this article not very surprising. After reading Thomas Friedman's book, and journeying through Bangalore, I expected most of these dire countries to be on their way to the top of the technological turning point. Ethiopia is one of Africa's poorest countries, yet they spend 1/10 of their GDP on information technology. Although I do not know what GDP stands for, I know it is consuming a bulk of the countries income.
This technological boost is not just to put them on the playing ground with the rest of the competitive world. This change is being made to upgrade their entire lifestyles tremendously.
Meles Zanawi, the Ethiopian prime minister talks of IT providing a short cut to development. "I want to see ICT pervade all our activities as a government, not just in the urban areas. WE want to connect all our villages in two to three years. All education services, likewise. We would also like to provide telemedice".
I never even heard of telemedicine, much less expect a country so far behind to have it apart of their vocabulary. Since the 1980's, only 1.2% of the country owned telephones and less than 0.1% goes online. Technology never seemed to be as important or pressing to their lives. However, it is starting to prove that no matter where you, what country you are from, technology is the determining factor in a life of success. So over the next 5 years, the Ethiopian government plans on spending over 100 million dollars on public sector computers.
Meles (prime minister) says, "IT is no luxury... but rather a crucial weapon to fight poverty".
School-net and Woredanet are some of the upcoming enhances Ethiopia hopes to conquer. School-net will overcome the desperate shortages of teaches. They also plan to use video lessons, enables teachers and students the same to endure 8 hours of straight education. Woredanet is the country's first step in e-government. "For the first time the network connects all 600 of Ethiopia's local councils (woredas) to 11 regional capitals through internet telephone and video-conferencing. Half the links are by cable, and half by satellite. The broadband infrastructure also offers the chance for small towns to install their first payphone."
"The capital, Addis Ababa, looks so changed that it is easy to fall intro the trap of over-optimism about an IT-enabled future. But Ethiopia is not Addis Ababa. So long as the vast majority of its people are subsistence farmers scraping a living from a hostile environment, IT can only be part of a bigger package of slow and painful reform.
That doesn't mean it is not a good investment. In any case, Ethiopian's don't regard themselves as second-class human beings: no outsider is going to persuade then to have second-class ambitions".
This technological boost is not just to put them on the playing ground with the rest of the competitive world. This change is being made to upgrade their entire lifestyles tremendously.
Meles Zanawi, the Ethiopian prime minister talks of IT providing a short cut to development. "I want to see ICT pervade all our activities as a government, not just in the urban areas. WE want to connect all our villages in two to three years. All education services, likewise. We would also like to provide telemedice".
I never even heard of telemedicine, much less expect a country so far behind to have it apart of their vocabulary. Since the 1980's, only 1.2% of the country owned telephones and less than 0.1% goes online. Technology never seemed to be as important or pressing to their lives. However, it is starting to prove that no matter where you, what country you are from, technology is the determining factor in a life of success. So over the next 5 years, the Ethiopian government plans on spending over 100 million dollars on public sector computers.
Meles (prime minister) says, "IT is no luxury... but rather a crucial weapon to fight poverty".
School-net and Woredanet are some of the upcoming enhances Ethiopia hopes to conquer. School-net will overcome the desperate shortages of teaches. They also plan to use video lessons, enables teachers and students the same to endure 8 hours of straight education. Woredanet is the country's first step in e-government. "For the first time the network connects all 600 of Ethiopia's local councils (woredas) to 11 regional capitals through internet telephone and video-conferencing. Half the links are by cable, and half by satellite. The broadband infrastructure also offers the chance for small towns to install their first payphone."
"The capital, Addis Ababa, looks so changed that it is easy to fall intro the trap of over-optimism about an IT-enabled future. But Ethiopia is not Addis Ababa. So long as the vast majority of its people are subsistence farmers scraping a living from a hostile environment, IT can only be part of a bigger package of slow and painful reform.
That doesn't mean it is not a good investment. In any case, Ethiopian's don't regard themselves as second-class human beings: no outsider is going to persuade then to have second-class ambitions".
