KM & Social Challenges

CapacityPlus.org -focused on the health workforce needed to achieve the MDGs

KMAadmin — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 06:56:56 -0600

CapacityPlus is a USAID-funded global project focused on the health workforce needed to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. CapacityPlus offers state-of-the-art expertise, models, tools, training, and analyses adapted to each context. These services help countries move closer to having the right health worker in the right place with the right skills and support. We work with public, nonprofit, faith-based, and for-profit organizations contributing to better human resources for health. The site features:

News and stories from the project
Tools, resources, and publications in our Knowledge Library
A weekly summary on health workforce news from around the globe, with links
A listing of relevant conferences and meetings
A blog with perspectives on the global health workforce challenge—and solutions.

CapacityPlus helps partner countries achieve significant progress in addressing the health worker crisis building on the accomplishments of the Capacity Project, which worked in 47 countries. Capacity Partners Website www,capacityplus.org

KM & Governance

Introduction to Knowledge Management (KM) of Enterprises & TVET Institutions

Moustafa Wahba — Sun, 02 May 2010 03:02:42 -0600

By: Eng. Mousatafa Wahba, Competency Assurance & TVET Consultant

What is Knowledge Management KM within Enterprises & TVET Institutions?

In the present day, in a very simplified manner, Knowledge Management KM within an Enterprise or Technical and Vocational Education and Training TVET Institution can be considered as an approach that enables each member of the Enterprise / Institution to individually know and apply what the Enterprise or TVET Institution knows as a whole, enables the Enterprise or TVET Institution to know what each member knows individually and reuse it at group level, and allows each member to recognize what he / she do not know and should learn.
Think of a coded welder as a simplified example of a knowledge worker. Coded welders do more high standard welding works than normal welders. When asked, a coded welder will give advice to other normal welders who can derive a benefit from the coded welder's advice such as a particular ‘TIG’ welding job. If a coded welder is willing to share what he knows with other normal welders, then they all may eventually earn more money.

What Constitutes intellectual or Knowledge-based Assets?

Not all information is valuable. Therefore, it's up to individual Enterprise or TVET Institution to determine what information qualifies as intellectual and knowledge-based assets. Intellectual and knowledge-based assets are either “Explicit Knowledge” consists of anything that is fully and clearly defined and can be documented, archived and codified, often with the help of IT or ‘Implicit Knowledge”, in which the knowledge that implied though is not directly expressed or the know-how contained in people's heads.
Shadowing and joint-problem solving are two best practices for transferring or recreating implicit knowledge inside an Enterprise or TVET Institution. In shadowing, less experienced staff observes more experienced staff in their activities to learn how their more experienced counterparts approach their work dialog and crystallize the knowledge transfer. As the trainees / students are often unaware of how they approach problems or do their work and therefore can’t automatically generate step-by-step instructions for doing whatever they do, the joint problem-solving support the trainees / students to work together as beginners with expert on a task / project with a view to bring the expert’s approach in solving problems to light.

Why we need Knowledge Management KM within Enterprises & TVET Institutions?

We need Knowledge Management KM within TVET Enterprises & TVET Institutions due to the following specific business factors:

Achieving substantial savings, significant improvements in human performance, and competitive advantage.
Reductions in staffing create a need to replace informal knowledge with formal methods.
The amount of time available to experience and acquire knowledge has diminished.
Early retirements and increasing mobility of the work force lead to loss of knowledge.
There is a need to manage increasing complexity in knowledge.
Enterprises & TVET Institutions compete on the basis of knowledge.
Provision of competent workers and training services are increasingly complex, endowing them with a significant information component.
The need for life-long learning is an inescapable reality.

What are the benefits and motivations leading Enterprises & TVET Institutions to undertake a KM project?

An effective KM programme should help an Enterprise or TVET Institution to do one or more of the following:

Promote innovation by encouraging the free flow of ideas
Improve customer (enterprise as end user) service by streamlining response time
Boost revenues by getting products (competent workers) and training services to market faster
Enhance Enterprise or TVET Institution’s retention rates by recognizing the value of employees' knowledge and rewarding them for it
Streamline operations and reduce costs by eliminating redundant or unnecessary processes
A creative approach to KM can result in improved efficiency, higher productivity and increased revenues in practically any business function
Making available increased knowledge content in the development and provision of competent workers and training services
Facilitating and managing innovation and Enterprise or TVET Institution’s learning
Leveraging the expertise of staff across the Enterprise or the TVET Institution
Solving intractable or wicked problems
The concept of KM embodies a transition from the recently popular concept of 'information value chain' to a 'knowledge value chain.' What is the difference? The information value chain considers technological systems as key components guiding the organization's business processes, while treating humans as relatively passive processors that implement 'best practices' archived in information databases. In contrast, the knowledge value chain treats human systems as key components that engage in continuous assessment of information archived in the technological systems. In this view, 'best practices' are not implemented without active inquiry by the human actors. Human actors engage in an active process of sense making to continuously assess the effectiveness of 'best practices.' The underlying premise is that 'best practices' of yesterday may not be taken for granted as 'best practices' of today or tomorrow. Hence, double loop learning, unlearning and relearning processes need to be designed into the Enterprise or TVET Institution business processes.
KM is necessary for Enterprise or TVET Institution because what worked yesterday may or may not work tomorrow. Enterprise or TVET Institution that were providing enterprises with competent workers became obsolete regardless of the efficiency of their learning, education and training processes since their graduated workers didn't keep up with the changing needs of the market. The same holds for assumptions about the optimal Enterprise or TVET Institution structure, the control and coordination systems, the motivation and incentive schemes, and so forth. To remain aligned with the dynamically changing needs of the business environment, Enterprise or TVET Institution need to continuously assess their internal theories of business for ongoing effectiveness. That is the only viable means for ensuring that today's 'core competencies' do not become 'core rigidities' of tomorrow.

What are the KM Strategies?

Knowledge is accessed through three stages: before, during, or after KM-related activities.
The traditional Performance Measurement System in the industrial era is losing its relevance in today’s fast changing environment where Enterprises & TVET Institutions are re-shaped into flat multi-functional hierarchies and their business models, teams’ roles and responsibilities are becoming more complex. It is therefore becoming more essential to move towards Performance Driven Enterprises & TVET Institutions and include KM in the performance appraisals with a view replace the traditional Performance Measurement System and improve the Performance Measurement Plans
One strategy to KM involves actively managing knowledge (push strategy). In such an instance, individuals strive to explicitly encode their knowledge into a shared knowledge repository, such as a database, as well as retrieving knowledge they need that other individuals have provided to the repository.
Another strategy to KM involves individuals making knowledge requests of Subject Matter Experts SMEs associated with a particular subject on an ad hoc basis (pull strategy). In such an instance, SMEs can provide their insights to the particular person or people needing this.
Other Knowledge Management Strategies for Enterprises & TVET Institutions include:
- Rewards (as a means of motivating for knowledge sharing)
- Storytelling (as a means of transferring implicit knowledge)
- Cross-project learning
- After action reviews
- Knowledge mapping (a map of knowledge repositories within an Enterprise or TVET Institution and accessible by all)
- Code of practice
- Best practice transfer
- Risk management
- Benchmarking
- Competence management (systematic evaluation and planning of competences of individual Enterprise or TVET Institution
- Proximity & architecture (the physical situation of employees can be either conducive or obstructive to knowledge sharing)
- Master-apprentice relationship
- Collaborative technologies (groupware, etc)
- Knowledge repositories (databases, etc)
- Measuring and reporting intellectual capital (a way of making explicit knowledge for companies)
- Knowledge brokers (some TVET Centre / CoC’s members take on responsibility for a specific "field" and act as first reference on whom to talk about a specific subject)
- Social software (wikis, social bookmarking, blogs, etc)

Categorization of Knowledge Management Approaches

1. Mechanistic approaches to Knowledge Management
Mechanistic approaches to KM are characterized by the application of technology and resources to do more of the same better.

2. Cultural / behaviorist approaches to Knowledge Management
Cultural / behaviorist approaches, with substantial roots in process re-engineering and change management, tend to view the "knowledge problem" as a management issue. Technology — though ultimately essential for managing explicit knowledge resources — is not the solution. These approaches tend to focus more on innovation and creativity (the learning Enterprise or TVET Institution) than on leveraging existing explicit resources or making working knowledge explicit.

3. Systematic approaches to Knowledge Management
Systematic approaches to KM retain the traditional faith in rational analysis of the knowledge problem: the problem can be solved, but new thinking of many kinds is required.

How to promote a KM project in an Enterprise or TVET Institution?

Don’t label the project as KM because the term causes so much confusion. Everyone has a different definition of KM (if they even know what it is) and those who have heard of it and have heard of all the failures associated with KM projects will be inherently biased against the KM project.
Instead of calling the project as KM, consider it as a project designed to solve a particular learning / education / training problem within the Enterprise or TVET Institution. The KM project is much more likely to succeed if it addresses an actual learning / education / training goal or specific pain point, like improving collaboration in order to bring a product to market faster than the competition.

How to Demonstrate the Value of a KM Project?

In order to highlight the pay back of a KM project it’s often wise just to promise that the project will pay for itself (if indeed it will) and therefore is worth trying out to see if incremental benefits can be gained. That approach works well if you’re trying to get funding from executives who habitually doubts generally accepted belief of KM.
Instead of attempting to demonstrate the Enterprise or TVET Institution wide value for a KM project, look for value at the individual level. For example, if the project will reduce the amount of time for the Enterprise or TVET Institution’s training life cycle, you might be able to sell the project on that basis.

What is the Best Way to Approach KM?

Start with smaller projects in order to have more control over the outcome, and less failure. Getting funding for a series of smaller projects is more feasible than getting funding for an Enterprise or TVET Institution wide initiative, especially if the benefits are hard to quantify.
Define the achievement value of the KM initiative and establish at the outset metrics that will prove the success of the KM initiative
Do not divorce the KM programme from a business goal. While sharing best practices is a commendable idea, there must be an underlying business reason to do so. Without a solid business case, KM will be an exercise having no useful result.

What Are the Challenges of KM?

Getting Enterprise or TVET Institution’s Staff on Board

The major problems that occur in KM usually result because the Enterprise or the TVET Institution ignore the people and cultural issues. In an environment where an individual’s knowledge is valued and rewarded, establishing a culture that recognizes implied knowledge which is not directly expressed and encourages employees to share it is critical. The need to sell the KM concept to employees shouldn't be underestimated. In many cases employees are being asked to deliver their knowledge and experience to prove that they are valuable as individuals.

KM Requires Ongoing Maintenance

As with many physical assets, the value of knowledge can erode over time. Since knowledge can get loosing freshness stale fast, the content in a KM program should be constantly validated, amended and updated. Relevance of knowledge at any given time changes as do the skills of employees and therefore, there is no endpoint to a KM programme.

Dealing with a Great Flood of Data

Enterprises & TVET Institutions deal with a great flood of data and KM programme has to identify and disseminate knowledge from a sea of information on the basis that quantity rarely equals quality.

How Can KM Project Be Supported?

In order to support a KM project and get the Enterprise or TVET Institution’s staff use the systems and processes designed to facilitate KM, we should:

Pilot the project among Enterprise or TVET Institution’s staff who have the most to gain and would be the most open to sharing their knowledge. This will vary depending on the TVET Centre / CoC.
Involve a selected group of influencers & employees in the pilot who are well-respected by their peers and whose opinions are highly regarded in the Enterprise or the TVET Institution with a view to convince others of the merits of KM.
Transform the knowledge collection and make easily accessible and suitable for dissemination into everyday jobs of the Enterprise or the TVET Institution.
Link KM directly to job performance, create a safe climate for the Enterprise or TVET Institution’s staff to share ideas and recognize people who contribute to the KM effort.
Many Enterprises & TVET Institutions create incentive programmes to motivate employees to share their knowledge. This can work, but the danger with incentive programs is that employees will participate solely to earn incentives, without regard to the quality or relevance of the information they contribute. Ideally, participation in KM should be its own reward. If KM doesn't make life easier for employees, it will fail.

What is the Most Important for Enterprises & TVET Institutions to Do in Knowledge Management?

The most important KM issues for Enterprises & TVET Institutions are:

Focus on the cooperative interaction of data and processing capacity of information technologies IT and the creative and innovative capacity of the human members. Advanced information technologies can increasingly accomplish 'programmable' tasks traditionally done by humans.

If a procedure can be programmed, it can be delegated to Information Technology in one form or another. The information and control systems in an Enterprise or TVET Institution are intended to achieve the 'programming' for optimization and efficiency. However, checks and balances need to be built into the Enterprise or the TVET Institution’s learning, education and training processes to ensure that such 'programmes' are continuously updated in alignment with the dynamically changing external environment.

The Enterprise or TVET Institution’s learning, education and training processes need to implement what is called 'loose tight' Knowledge Management Systems. The tightening is in the reinforcing linkage between the archived Enterprise or TVET Institution’s 'best practices' and the actions taken by Enterprise or the TVET Institution’s members based on that information. The loosening is in the reverse separating linkage between actions taken by Enterprise or TVET Institution’s members that serve as a continuous check for renewing the archived 'best practices.' This is where human creativity and innovation comes into the picture.

Eng. Moustafa Mohamed Moustafa Wahba
Competency Assurance & TVET Consultant
Contact:
Egypt
Mobile: 0020101469376
Res. 002/03/5831540, 5854769 (Alexandria) - 002/046/4063005 (Marina)
E-mail address: mmm_wahba@hotmail.com

KM & Governance

The role of translation in Knowledge Management

charlesd — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 04:22:32 -0600

"Indigenous African knowledge has much to offer science — but only if science can be translated into local languages" Charles Dhewa.

Africans have a rich cultural heritage and a wealth of traditional knowledge on topics ranging from agricultureand forestry to medicines and medical practices — all of which could make valuable contributions to modern science. For example, traditional knowledge of drought-resistant crop varieties could prove crucial in helping small farmers across the continent adapt to climate change. Much of this type of knowledge is embedded in the diverse local languages and cultures found in Africa.

Yet despite centuries of scientific undertakings on the continent, there is still no vernacular word for 'science'. In Southern Africa, science remains a minority, English-language based, pursuit that reinforces the domination of English at the expense of local languages such as Ndebele, Swahili and many others.

This marginalisation of African languages and practices means much local knowledge is lost. Many innovations by farmers and rural communities are excluded from modern science and technology (S&T) because there are no local terms or expressions to capture them.

It is vital for ordinary people to be able to participate in science innovation. Moving the large body of indigenous knowledge into mainstream S&T systems will help address pressing development issues on the continent.

Engaging ordinary people with S&T could also help prevent unfair exploitation of natural resources and make citizens more aware of laws protecting these resources at national and regional levels.

Domesticating science

African policymakers must make an effort to 'domesticate' science by usingvernacular languages to talk about it. This means investing in translation activities.

Literal translation is, of course, an important aspect. Initiatives to compile science dictionaries are a welcome step forward. Zimbabwean scientist Christopher Chetsanga is, for example, compiling a dictionary in the Shona language — spoken by nine million people in Zimbabwe — that should do much to improve local understanding of scientific terms and issues.

Certainly, big institutions such as the UN Economic Commission for Africa and huge initiatives such as the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development should use translation to add value to the mountains of documents they publish in English.

But it's not just individual words that need translating, it's also the expression of ideas and meanings, formed in one context and received and interpreted in very different ones.

Integrating ideas

To achieve this we must strengthen the role of intermediaries with specialist communication skills — people who can translate and summarise complex S&T ideas in local languages and explain both the concepts and implications with simplicity. Such people are sometimes called 'integrators', 'filters' and 'synthesisers'.

Integrators combine separate ideas into one body of knowledge. An integrator can adequately combine indigenous and scientific knowledge on climate change in ways that are meaningful to ordinary people. Filtering includes editing and clarifying ideas so that people can understand the benefits of, for example, biotechnology, without bias or misunderstanding. Synthesisers effectively summarise key issues.

Translating the issues around topics such as climate change and biotechnology, where debate is often highly polarised, requires all three skills.

Intermediaries can sometimes do more than simply explain the science. They might, for example, be able to draw attention to opportunities around intellectual property.

And intermediaries can draw marginal communities into modern scientific discourses, enhancing collaboration with researchers and formal S&T organisations.

Translation activities should also promote cross-disciplinary sharing and collaboration. Many S&T disciplines still operate as self-contained silos. In Africa, for example, civil engineers rarely communicate with agricultural researchers, with potentially serious consequences for rural farmers.

Boosting farmers' yields through agricultural research is of little value if the transport infrastructure, including roads and bridges, cannot get their crop to market.

Paying for progress

Of course, domesticating S&T through translation can only succeed with sufficient investment to support it. In theory, money for translation activities should come out of national S&T budgets. But these remain very small in Africa.

Despite African Union members promising, in 2007, to spend one per cent of their GDP (gross domestic product) on research and development, only two countries are doing so — Rwanda and Tunisia (see Africa Analysis: Progress on science spending). The average spend across the continent is just 0.4 per cent — translation funds are unlikely to be found here.

An alternative source of funding, recently championed by my scientific colleagues in Zimbabwe, could be national S&T taxes, modelled on Zimbabwe's three per cent HIV/AIDS Levy, introduced in 1999. The levy has been remarkably successful in ensuring funds for HIV/AIDS activities, including access to lifesaving antiretrovirals, despite the country's economic turmoil.

A S&T Levy could be used to finance all aspects of research and development, including translation activities. It could also help promote industrialisation and help local producers and manufacturers add value to their products.

Whatever the route to accessing money, the fact remains that science translation activities in Africa are urgently needed if we are to tap into the energy, entrepreneurship, creativity and intelligence of our people.

Charles Dhewa is the managing consultant for communications and knowledge management consultancy Knowledge Transfer Africa in Harare, Zimbabwe.

KM & Social Challenges

Will Knowledge ‘R’ us (not “Knowlege 'R' ours”) shape the future of knowledge and KM?

Md Santo — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 08:04:48 -0600

Will Knowledge ‘R’ us (not “Knowlege 'R' ours”) shape the future of knowledge and KM?

By : Dr Md Santo – http://mobeeknowledge.ning.com

The nature of Homo Sapiens comprising three knowing tools components. The first is Peripheral Nerve System or Human Senses including our Autonomic Nerve System representing Human Knowledge with Lower Consciousness (KLC). The second is Central Nerve System or Mind Brain representing Human Knowledge with Medium Consciousness (KMC). The third is Human Consciousness DNA representing Human Knowledge with Higher Consciousness (KHC). If it is postulated that nature of Knowledge Management (KM) derived from the nature of Human or we could say Human System Biology (HSB)-based KM, then we will observe that KM Tools mainly generated from KLC, KM Process Framework generated from KMC as well as KM Standards (culture and value management) generated from KHC respectively ( http://mobeeknowledge.ning.com/forum/topics/brief-description-of-our )
Consequently Knowledge which is located at the domain of DIKW continuum model as commonly believed has a narrow meaning. Hence, I suggested to separate DI with KW considering each is an entity into DI – KW model to give emphasize the paradigm I’ve just mentioned above (http://mobeeknowledge.ning.com/forum/topics/blooms-taxonomy-knowledge-an... )
Therefore, Knowledge Management (KM) essentially is not management technique but behaving more as an access mechanisms that can be used across any management tool type such as Total Quality Management, Learning Organization, Benchmarking, Process Classification Framework, Business Process Reengineering, Balanced Scorecard, Business Intelligence including Social Media platforms etc. wherein each with their specific functions to be orchestrated under KM’s consciousness. So, here we put KM in incredibly broad meaning as subject with higher level than any other management tool type which is treated only as object ( http://www.scribd.com/doc/28696847/How-to-re-postulating-the-paradigm-of... ) From eastern concept, Knowledge with broad meaning also known as Noor or “Light”
I use the phrase “KNOWLEDGE ‘R’ US”, not “KNOWLEDGE ‘R’ OURS” as the expression of the paradigm of K as well as KM just mentioned above wherein human knowledge from beginning of our life represent human consciousness as well as our personality functioning to lead us in our journey through the path of Physical Realities – Data – Information – Knowledge (narrow meaning) – Wisdom and above . In eastern people beyond Wisdom frequently called as “Ma’rifat”
The overall description in schematic as well as in presentation forms could be accessed through the list of the links below. To get explanation more in details you could visit our gateway links by choosing relevant article(s) or topic(s) at http://delicious.com/mobeeknowledge and/or http://delicious.com/tags/mobeeknowledge?view=all& . And last but not least, just to emphasize from my point of view I’ve recognized at least 10 “symptoms and signs” toward the future of next gen KM – visit http://www.scribd.com/doc/27484344/Ten-Landmarks-Toward-Next-Generation-Knowledge-Management

List of the “KNOWLEDGE ‘R’ US” related links are as follow : (Source Link : http://www.scribd.com/doc/29259487/KNOWLEDGE-R-US )

Human Body Knowing Tools as Human Consciousness Related to Knowledge Management - http://www.scribd.com/doc/28959294/Human-Body-Knowing-Tools-as-Human-Con...
How to re-postulating the paradigm of Knowledge and Knowledge Management - http://www.scribd.com/doc/28696847/How-to-re-postulating-the-paradigm-of...
Road to Next Gen Knowledge Management : “Mobee Knowledge Top Four Articles of the Month” - http://www.scribd.com/doc/28435600/Road-to-Next-Gen-Knowledge-Management-“Mobee-Knowledge-Top-Four-Articles-of-the-Month”
Bloom's Taxonomy (Learning Domains)* related with Knowledge and Knowledge Management (KM)** - http://www.scribd.com/doc/28370204/Bloom-s-Taxonomy-Learning-Domains-rel...
How to convert Knowledge Into Knowledge Management - http://www.scribd.com/doc/28177748/How-to-convert-Knowledge-Into-Knowled...
Ten Landmarks Toward Next Generation Knowledge Management - http://www.scribd.com/doc/27484344/Ten-Landmarks-Toward-Next-Generation-...
The Origin of Knowledge and Knowledge Management derived from DI-KW separated entities model - http://www.scribd.com/doc/26869572/The-Origin-of-Knowledge-and-Knowledge...
Towards Human System Biology-based Next Gen KM - http://www.scribd.com/doc/25765257/Towards-Human-System-Biology-based-Ne...
Knowledge Management System Development Derived From Human System Biology - http://www.scribd.com/doc/25613526/Knowledge-Management-System-Developme...
Explaining Step by Step the Process of Knowledge Management 2.0 Map - http://www.scribd.com/doc/25036410/Explaining-Step-by-Step-the-Process-o...
KM Metrics to Locate Your Achievements in the Universe - http://www.scribd.com/doc/24808191/KM-Metrics-to-Locate-Your-Achievement...
You Are the Knowledge - Hybrid Definition of Knowledge - http://www.scribd.com/doc/24439826/You-Are-the-Knowledge-Hybrid-Definiti...
The Physics of Knowledge - http://www.scribd.com/doc/24339159/The-Physics-of-Knowledge
WEB-BASED KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT 2.0 MAP - http://www.scribd.com/doc/24331515/WEB-BASED-KNOWLEDGE-MANAGEMENT-2-0-MAP

@2010 Md Santo

KM & Communications

Learning does not end :TIB Library in Hannover

libman — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 10:28:28 -0600

Collence.T. Chisita and fellow professionals on a study visit in Germany. This was a learning session on new trends in interlending and document supply initiatives

KM & Social Challenges

Reconstructing public administration in post-conflict situations

KMAadmin — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 00:49:17 -0600

The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs highlights the issue of how to reconstruct public administration in post-conflict situations so as to enable it to promote peace and development in countries that have been affected by civil war and destruction.

Countries emerging from conflict situations are almost always plagued by social upheaval, damaged infrastructure, reduced productive capacity, severe revenue shortfalls, seriously weakened human resources and greatly diminished security.

The challenges are daunting as post-conflict governments strive to ensure peace and security, foster social reconciliation and promote development. Yet recovery is possible if the public administration can earn the trust of the people, effectively provide services to all and operate in an efficient, effective, transparent and accountable way. In fact, whereas the root causes of intrastate conflict are usually assumed to be poverty and economic inequality or clashes among different ethnic or religious groups, the central cause of violent conflict is ineffective leadership, weak governance institutions, inappropriate human resources, lack of mechanisms to engage citizens in public policy-making decisions and lack of or ineffective delivery of public services.

The report emphasizes that because post-conflict situations are heterogeneous, there are no “one size fits all” solutions to governance challenges. In each country, public administration reforms should be tailored to local needs. The report also
highlights that contrary to commonly held belief, post-conflict situations not only present challenges, but also offer numerous opportunities to leapfrog stages of development by adopting innovative practices in public administration, particularly the application of ICTs in government and service delivery in the information age we all live in.

A United Nations Publication
Publication No.: ST/ESA/PAD/SER.E/135
March 2010
Copyright © United Nations, 2010
All rights reserved

KM & Governance

collence takaingenhamo chisita :power in the book

libman — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 08:26:12 -0600

This shows that print resources will be with us despite the rapid growth of e-books.

KM & Social Challenges

Knowledge management patterns in government technical institutions of Higher Learning in Harare.

libman — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 00:28:37 -0600

By : Collence.T.Chisita

ABSTRACT

This paper is going to assess the knowledge management patterns in the government technical institutions of Higher learning in Harare. The writer will explore the shifts in knowledge production within these institutions explore the shifts in knowledge production within these institutions of Higher learning and try to establish any interdisciplinary collaboration between industry, education and other stakeholders. This paper will also outline the knowledge management systems and their role in complementing educational objectives. This will be explored in the context of a global information or knowledge society in which the quality of life, and the prospects for social and economic development depend increasingly upon information and its effective exploitation.

The writer will expound that the information society would be a society in which the patterns of work and leisure, education and the market system are all influenced by developments in information and knowledge. The writer envisages the country of focus as an evolving post –industrial society whose contours would be based on information and knowledge just as the industrial society was characterized by a society driven by the production of goods and services. The concept of knowledge and information management has become topical to the extent that it is now on the agenda of many formal organizations and Zimbabwe is no exception.

Knowledge has become increasingly more valuable than the traditional tangible assets and this is why the writer is motivated to investigate the knowledge management patterns in government technical institutions of Higher learning in Harare. The writer’s interest to conduct this study has been triggered by the fact that technical institutions of higher learning in Zimbabwe have embarked on programmes on how information and knowledge can be utilized to realize Millennium Development Goals. Knowledge management is here viewed as a concept that refers to the broad collection of organizational practices and approaches relating to knowledge creation, coordination and promotion and application in dealing with practical problems.

INTRODUCTION

Morrow defines knowledge management as a concept that encompasses the sum total of organizational practices and approaches relating to the generation, dissemination and application of knowledge.1 Bernborn views Knowledge management as a process of discovering knowledge and being able to systematically organize it for use and the value that is derived from sharing and systematically using it.2The concept of” knowledge “ can be traced back time immemorial as communities struggled to acquire knowledge to enable them master nature rather than live at its mercy. Knowledge refers to the state of knowing, the capacity for action and codified, captured and accumulated facts.

It was through the acquisition of knowledge that societies were able to evolve from one mode of production to the other. Knowledge management as an academic discipline is arguably in its infancy with such terms like “knowledge economy” and knowledge society evolving. The common denominator of the various definitions of knowledge management involves the exploitation and development of organisation’s intellectual assets with a view to realize organizational goals.

The concept has a close relationship with epistemological debates in ancient and contemporary Western philosophies, for example, Descartes argued that there was need for a body of knowledge about knowledge. It has now become a universally topical issue as it dominates the agenda of institutions of higher education. Kidwell (et.al) notes that Colleges and Universities have an opportunity to apply knowledge management to every part of their mission because there is tremendous value that can be derived from such initiatives, for example, an institution wide approach to knowledge management can result in an exponential improvement in sharing knowledge, improvement in client satisfaction, competitive advantage and realization of organizational goals.3

HIGHER EDUCATION AND KM

Professor Jennifer Rowley notes that Higher Education institutions are in the knowledge business because generally they are involved in knowledge creation, coordination and promotion.4 Knowledge management is critical for national development because successful organizations are judged by how they utilise knowledge in order to realize organizational objectives and institutions of higher learning in Zimbabwe are no exception to this trend. Kidwell (et.al) notes that in the current age of information economies, higher education institutions have significant opportunities to apply knowledge management practices to support every part of their mission.5

Institutions of higher learning are the engines of national development and it is imperative that they should be involved in promoting the drive towards a knowledge driven economy. The writer goes on to state that sharing knowledge is the main purpose for the existence of institutions of higher learning and as such the Harare Polytechnic and other government institutions in Harare are satiated with examples of programmes whereby they have leveraged knowledge to stimulate innovation and achieve organizational success as the engines of social and economic transformation.

BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

Zimbabwe has invested heavily in higher education because the integration of knowledge, education and technology will accelerate the drive towards the realization of a knowledge society. Muganda notes that the integration of knowledge technology and livelihood in education systems basically means an integration of general education that is normally obtained through formal or non-formal training with vocational skills and competencies that are relevant to the social and economic well-being of the learners and the society.6 This approach to knowledge generation is premised on the notion that learners learn to acquire skills and knowledge in order to transform information to knowledge relevant in solving day-to-day problems encountered by the community.

The institutions of Higher Education have been integrated within the frameworks of knowledge creation, production, reproduction and consumption process and this also includes the incorporation of both formal and non-formal education. This integrated educational system has provided the basis for the development of a knowledge society in Zimbabwe. Technical institutions of Higher Education have incorporated knowledge with social, economic and technological development within the local and universal context of their respective environments.

METHODOLOGY

The study was based on the survey methodology, which involved the use of interviews and questionnaires to collect data. In this study the researcher combined data collection techniques to collect information from the research departments of the target government technical institutions of higher Education in Harare. This design was chosen because it enabled the researcher to collect data from dispersed population within the parameters of Harare. The researcher also used the observation method to obtain first hand information pertaining to the research phenomenon.

ISOP AS AN OUTREACH PROGRAMME

The Harare Polytechnic has in place the Integrated School Outreach Programme or (ISOP) whereby the college works with rural communities to impart skills that are meaningful to the livelihood. The college has been able to take the knowledge and skills to the rural people by firstly identifying the knowledge and skills deficiencies within the community, secondly seconding qualified staff to train the locals in income generating projects like sewing, building, dress making, business management and other relevant disciplines. This ISOP project is a typical example of a bottom up or grass-roots adoption of Knowledge management, which reflects the human and cultural dimension of knowledge management through the vehicle of communities of practice.

The Integrated School Outreach Programme involves the College going out to the community to find out the training needs of local communities. It is departure from the conventional system whereby students do apply to study a curriculum is that is readily designed for them by the curriculum development unit. The local communities have immensely benefited in terms of acquiring skills in baking, soap making, dressmaking, welding, carpentry and building. This approach reaffirms the notion that education should be geared towards equipping students with life-long skills that will enable them to effectively deal with the socio- economic challenges of life.
“ …the whole process of education should be conceived as the process of learning to think through the solution of real problems…”7

RESPONDING TO LOCAL NEEDS

The people centered approach towards knowledge generation is driven by the needs of the local people and it is part of the process of democratising education so that it is accessible to all irrespective of one’s social standing. This programme has seen the Harare Polytechnic’s lecturing staff being deployed in rural areas to impart knowledge and skills on projects relevant to the local communities, for example, dressmaking, building, welding and carpentry. It is through such programmes that the concept of intellectual humility as outlined by Steve Covey is realized and upheld as illustrated by one of his comments “principle centered people are constantly educated by their experiences…They discover that the more they know the more they realize that they do not know; that is as their circle of knowledge grows so, thus its outside edge of ignorance grows” 8

INNOVATIONS IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Another significant stride by the Polytechnic can also be noted in the Jatropha Biodiesel Project. Through its Science and Technology Department, it managed to carry out a research project that resulted in the production of Biodiesel from the Jatropha plant commonly known as “Mujirimono” in Shona language. This project was embraced by the state and actually culminated in the commissioning of a national biodiesel plant at Mount Hampden near Harare. The national project now involves other players like Industry and Commerce including other stakeholders. Harare Polytechnic has a small press and small processing plant with a capacity of 500litres/day.

“The energy challenge for Africa requires a diversified approach and the need to recognise the potential contribution of various energy resources," 9

The other project that the College is embarking on includes the production of agricultural implements scotch –carts, disc harrows and ploughs to complement the Agricultural mechanization programme. This involves a partnership incorporating the college, industry and the government and this is true reflection that knowledge is being used to respond to local needs for sustainable development. This project has also involved students in live projects in the production of agricultural implements and this has given them experiences of producing products of value as well as an opportunity to contribute towards national development. The other collaborative projects includes the collaboration between the Departments of Civil, Electrical, and Mechanical Engineering drip irrigation technology which is also known as efficient irrigation technology. This technology is being customized to suit local needs in promoting sustainable development.

PARADIGM SHIFT IN KNOWLEDGE PRODUCTION

Such projects mark a paradigm shift from Mode 1 of knowledge production to Mode 2 of knowledge production which is characterized by partnerships, for example, there is an inter-disciplinary collaboration between science and technology focusing on production and automotive engineering focusing effect on the engine, automobile performance and other variables. This development validates what Gibbons and Scott (et.al) have always emphasized on the paradigm shifts in knowledge production. This has seen many organisations assuming an outward looking and responsive approach to local needs rather remaining insulated from local needs.10

OUTWARD LOOKING APPROACH IN HIGHER EDUCATION TRAINING

This outward looking approach towards education helps in that these colleges will be creating their own knowledge and they are also able to define this knowledge from their own perspectives rather than having other people defining knowledge for them. This is a reaffirmation of Nath assertion that it is imperative for developing countries to find and secure strategies for valuing and owning their knowledge and knowledge foundations.10 The writer goes further to assert that there is danger in uncritically accepting foreign knowledge and information that can distort reality especially in the context of information as a source of power. Saadar echoed similar sentiments”. Information and knowledge organized on the basis of a particular world view will direct the mind towards that world view and hence will influence the behavior of those who have (information and knowledge) imposed on them…”11

This new development also reaffirms Anantatula’s assertion that knowledge management is concerned with the use of Information Technology and tools, business processes, best practices and culture to develop and share knowledge within an Organisation and create linkages between people who possess knowledge and those who seek to know.12 These developments in the form of innovations have amplified and helped in shaping the magnitude along which trans-disciplinary cross fertilization and communication as a response to socio-economic problems is taking place and Zimbabwe’s technical institutions of Higher learning are no exception to this development.

The opening up of access to higher education to a wider array of social classes and age groups, with students from a diverse range of life and work experiences, has led to an equivalent shift in the 'higher learning' function of institutions. Technical institutions of Higher education in Zimbabwe have shifted from the elite cultures and specialist knowledge of privileged middle class to progrmmes that integrate the ideals and expectations of underprivileged communities, with references to the acquisition of relevant practical competencies critical for para-professionals, professionals and community life.

CHANGING PATTERNS

The changing pattern in knowledge production and consumption is also significantly notable in the changes and evolution of syllabi in curricula in the respective institutions and the new terminology reflecting the paradigm shift in the focus of today’s higher education. Originally the education system was mostly theoretical and then evolved into vocational where emphasis shifted to production. Now emphasis is not only being able to provide lower order skills but to become even more pro-active entrepreneurs who are the driving forces of economies. Such new terminologies or normenclature to describe the new phenomenon include ‘technopreneurship’, ‘technovation’, ‘infopreneurship’, ‘infobrokerage’, ‘creagement’ (creation management), including other more effervescent terms.

Harare Institute of Technology has demonstrated remarkable progress in implementing technopreneural projects. These have been mostly in their Science and Technology and Engineering departments. Various research projects that have been successfully implemented include the rural bathing geyser that uses coal heating, diesel making from steam of heat-charcoal, tobacco seed germinator, soya products like milk, yogurt and ice-cream. Products like the soya products have actually been patented and are now intellectual assets. Before these products are patented, they undergo technological incubation, i.e. testing and simulation to ensure that the ultimate product will conform to standards before commercialization. This is a remarkable feat, in view of the fact that patents and copyrights are the ultimate goal of knowledge production and management as institutions owning these can actually sell and get proceeds from knowledge generation through research and development!

Government technical instutitutions of higher learning have developed systems, in the form of libraries and electronic databases to support projects, which contribute to the systematic management of information. At institutional level there exists libraries with both centralized and decentralized systems to provide for the information needs of both students and staff. These facilities are also complemented by information resource centers providing Internet services at a subsidized rate to both students and lecturers. There is also the use of annual departmental reports that are then compiled into an annual college report by both technical institutions of Higher Education. These publications help to capture and accommodate useful knowledge that is kept for further reference and for posterity.

At the national level the National Archives of Zimbabwe exists to provide records management and archival services, for example, patents are deposited for safekeeping under highly strict security consideration. As a National Reference library the National Archives is legally mandated to offer reference and bibliographic services, which also feeds on to the universal bibliography control. Many colleges deposit dissertations with the National Archives.
CONCLUSION

The knowledge management patterns of technical institutions of Higher Education in Harare have changed to encompass an all-inclusive approach towards training. This involves creating linkages and networks between government technical institutions and industry and commerce. Organisations should prioritise knowledge management as it helps knowledge generation and in creating intellectual assets that can be marketed to generate wealth as well as creating employement. Institutions of higher learning should continue to set higher benchmarks in knowledge management as this will help to produce quality products. The shift in knowledge production have resulted an improvement of quality of products and services.

REFERENCES

Morrow,N.M.Knowledge Management Introduction In.Williams,M.E.(ed)Annual Review of Information Science and Technology(ARIST)p.382.
Jillinda, J.Kidwell (et.al)Applying corporate Knowledge Management Practices in Higher Education.In :Education Quartely.
Bernborm,G(ed)Information Alchemy:The Art and Science of Knowledge Management,EDUCAUSE Leadership Series,3.San Fransisco:Jossey Bass, 2001.
Rowley,J.I Higher Education ready for the Knowledge Management.In:International Journal of Educational Management.200.Volume.Issue 114p.325
Muganda, C.Developing a knowledge society in Developing communities:Challenges and Prospects.In:JIPE-Journal of Issues and Practices in Education.Vol.I,No.1, June, 2006.Dar Es Salaam:Open University of Tanzania.p.36.
Covey ,Steve.In:Kumar,G.Sociology of Information Management. 2nd.ed.New Delhi:Ashok Publications, 1998.p.191.
Lake, J.Lifelong learning skills:How to teach today’s children for tommorow’s challenges.Ontario:Pembroke,1997.p.64
African Development Bank Report, 2006.
Gibbons, Michael(et.al) (1994). The new production of knowledge: the dynamics of science and research in contemporary societies. London: Sage
Nath, V(2004) Heralding ICT enabled knowledge societies:Way forward for the developing countries, Policy Analyst,New York:UNDP
Saardar, Z.Information in the Muslim World:Astrategy for the Twenty -First century.London:Mansell, 1988.
Kumar, G.Sociology of information management.2nd.ed.New Delhi:Ashok Publications, 1998.
Anantula, V.(2005).Knowledge management criteria.In Stanskovsky, M.(ed)Creating the discipline of knowledgement.Oxford:Elsevier Butterworths Heinemann.p.171-181.
Mchombu,KWhich way African Librarianship?In IFLA Journal.No.17(1991)

BIBLIOGRAPHY

African Development Bank Report, 2006.
Anantula, V.(2005).Knowledge management criteria.In Stanskovsky, M.(ed)Creating the discipline of knowledgement.Oxford:Elsevier Butterworths Heinemann.p.171-181.
Bernborm,G(ed)Information Alchemy:The Art and Science of Knowledge Management,EDUCAUSE Leadership Series,3.San Fransisco:Jossey Bass, 2001.
Covey ,Steve.In:Kumar,G.Sociology of Information Management2nd.ed.New Delhi:Ashok Publications, 1998.p.191.
Gibbons, Michael(et.al) (1994). The new production of knowledge: the dynamics of science and research in contemporary societies. London: Sage.
Jillinda, J.Kidwell (et.al)Applying corporate Knowledge Management Practices in Higher Education.In :Education Quartely.
Kumar, G.Sociology of information management.2nd.ed.New Delhi:Ashok Publications, 1998.
Lake, J.Lifelong learning skills:How to teach today’s children for tommorow’s challenges.Ontario:Pembroke,1997.
Mchombu,KWhich way African Librarianship?In IFLA Journal.No.17(1991)
Morrow,N.M.Knowledge Management:An Intoduction.In.Williams,M.E.(ed)Annual Review of Information Science and Technology(ARIST)p.382.
Muganda, C.Developing a knowledge society in Developing communities:Challenges and Prospects.In:JIPE-Journal of Issues and Practices in Education.Vol.I,No.1, June, 2006.Dar Es Salaam:Open University of Tanzania.p.36.
Nath, V(2004) Heralding ICT enabled knowledge societies:Way forward for the developing countries, Policy Analyst,New York:UNDP.
Rowley,J.I Higher Education ready for the Knowledge Management.In:International Journal of Educational Management.200.Volume.Issue 114p.325
Saardar, Z.Information in the Muslim World:Astrategy for the Twenty -First century.London:Mansell, 1988.

KM & Social Challenges

African civilisation

libman — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 03:38:51 -0600

Collence.T.Chisita is a well known researcher who has raised the profile of LIS training in developing countries.Currently he is working on a collaboration on information organisation in oral shaped societies

KM & Social Challenges

The functions of current local legislation in ensuring compliance with legal deposit requirements in the electronic age

libman — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 07:29:33 -0600

The Functions of Current Local Legislation in Ensuring Compliance with Legal Deposit Requirements in the Context of Electronic Age: Case Study of Zimbabwe

By
Collence.T. Chisita 1
collencechisita@yahoo.com
zakstan@cooltoad.com
Collins.chisita@afritechno.com

Abstract

This paper seeks to describe the functions of current local legislation in ensuring compliance to legal deposit laws of Zimbabwe. It will identify and describe the current legislation that deal with bibliographic compilation and explain the main problems associated with current laws considering the current challenges of an information society. The country of focus has not been able to produce a National Bibliography for the past decade because of socio-economic problems. This problem has been further compounded by the fact that the current legal deposit law known as The Printed Publications Act (1975) has not been revised to incorporate new or current trends in the medium of information storage and retrieval. The writer will seek to examine the extent to which writers, researchers, and other stakeholders in the creative productions industry are adhering to the stipulations of the Printed Publications Act with reference to bibliographic control. The paper will also explain the weaknesses of the current law with reference to the legal deposit of electronic publications. It will also assess the impact of the failure to produce the National Bibliography on Universal Bibliographic control and also on scholars and researchers who intend to study material written by Zimbabweans. It will also highlight the factors that have caused the failure to produce the National Bibliography. The writer will also examine the challenges the country faces with regards to harmonizing print and electronic resources internet in the production of a National Bibliography. It will also try to explain the steps that are be taken by The National Library and Documentation Services in ensuring that a current and comprehensive National Bibliography will be in place by 2010. The paper will also suggest some recommendations on current legislation relating to legal deposit in the advent of Information and Communication driven world and provision and access to online resources.

Keywords: legal deposit, bibliographic control, legislation, Information and Communication Technology and Online Resources.

The Functions of Current Local Legislation in Ensuring Compliance with Legal Deposit Requirements in the Context of Electronic Age: Case Study of Zimbabwe

By
COLLLENCE.T.CHISITA
Introduction
Jules Larivie’re (2000:8) describes legal deposit as a statutory requirement that any organisation, commercial or public and any other individual producing any type of documentation in multiple copies is obligated to comply with by depositing one or more copies with a recognized national institution. Legal deposit helps to secure the preservation and transmission of a national cultural heritage for posterity for the benefit of future generations. The author further states that concept of legal deposit covers all types of published materials namely those published in multiple copies and offered to the public regardless of the means of transmission and those unique or archival materials of enduring value. This requirement was initially limited to print resources but with the emergence of Information and Communication Technology amendments were made to accommodate this new development.

The use of electronic means of communication to facilitate access to information has become the norm in the modern day world. Electronic publications are those that are formatted and produced in an electronic environment, for example, electronic equivalents of print publications, interactive databases, bulletin boards, discussion lists among others. These resources have an advantage over non-electronic resources in that they Smith(1999) is skeptical about electronic resources observed how people fail to weigh the negative aspects of digital resources and how this can impact heavily and negatively on collection development. The author noted that electronic resources raise expectations of benefits, costs reductions and efficiencies that are illusory and that if this was not taken into account electronic resources can put at risk the collections and services libraries have provided for decades. On the other hand electronic resources are advantageous in that they help to save time and space and can they are relatively easier to maintain.

Zumer (1987) defines a national bibliography as the cumulation of the authoritative and comprehensive records of the national imprints of a country published regularly and with the least possible delay. This great information retrieval tool is published in line with international standards. The users of the print or electronic bibliography include librarians, end users, book traders, rights management organisations, printers, organizers of book fairs, researchers and funding organizations.

The current technological developments in Information Management are introducing both challenges and opportunities for the future production of national bibliographies. Lertshela and Lor note that the emergence of the internet and the growth of electronic publishing world wide have created a serious challenge for National Libraries as far as their mandate as the National Depositories of all published materials. The two authors also noted that before the advent of the Internet it was easier to follow up on printed publications but now electronic resources pause a serious challenge because the internet is creating room for creators of works to evade legal deposit.Oltmans (2003) notes that the internet‘s web based resources require the process of web –harvesting which will ensure that there is automatic delivery of qualitative bibliographic descriptions. Many countries especially those in resource endowed countries have embrace the concept of electronic bibliographies while those countries in resource starved areas are still grappling with putting together an up to date print or hard copy bibliography.

Jules Larivie’re (2000) notes that in some countries like France , Greece, Zimbabwe and Indonesia the measure requiring legal deposit appears in a legal deposit Act, while in other countries like Australia and United States it is part of another act like the copyright act, National Library Act , as is the case in Canada , Japan and Nigeria. The author further notes that in those countries with a legal deposit system, published materials make up the basis of the national deposit collection while in other countries like Zimbabwe audio- visual materials are also subjected to legal deposit requirements.

Davidson (1988) notes that legal deposit facilitate bibliographic control which basically refers to the system of adequate recording of all forms of material published or unpublished printed or audio –visual or otherwise which add up to the sum total of human knowledge and experience. Currently many countries have modified their legislation to encompass electronic publications as subject to legal deposit while some have excluded online electronic publications because of the technical problems relating to acquisition and preservation of such materials.

Research Methodology

The researcher made use of the qualitative research design and this involved the use of the survey technique to collect data from the research respondents who included the archivists and librarians at the National Archives of Zimbabwe and sample of publishers from Harare. This involved the use of questionnaires and interviews. The researcher also made use of secondary sources of information to complement the primary sources.

Historical development of Legal Deposit

Historically legal deposit has been used as an effective mechanism of collecting and preserving a country’s published heritage for over four hundred years. The decree of King François I in the sixteenth century was the first text imposing a legal obligation on printers and booksellers to deposit a copy of each of their publications at the King's library and this enabled the aristocracy to monitor the content of published widely distributed works. The King was an advocate of learning and the arts and this was reflected by aristocratic library that he personally owned. Fournier(1993:4) notes that the main idea behind this piece of legislation was to collect and gather current and future publications of editions of books in order to ensure that it would be possible to refer to the original work and not the modified.

The rationale for legal deposit is that it facilitates access to published materials and it also provides authors protection for intellectual property rights through copyright but on another note legal deposit has been associated with censorship because lawmakers have used have used it as a tool to detect and curb blasphemous and seditious materials. This has been one reason why some publishers avoid depositing their materials with designated institutions because they fear censorship.

Kumar (1996) observed that this new development in France was triggered by the Guttenberg galaxy which ushered in a new era of published materials which threatened the status quo and many European countries were forced to introduce similar procedures based on the French model. The library and Archives of Canada note that initially legal deposit applied to books but in the second half of the nineteenth century it was extended to include serial publications, sound recordings, multimedia kits and in the twentieth century it embraced microforms, video recordings and currently online publications. Bell (1997) noted that over the years in its initial development legal deposit was used as a tool for surveillance and censorship as well as copyright. Larievere (2003) notes that through time legal deposit evolved from the original aims of the sixteenth century which were mainly to preserve books for future generations to the constitution of a national bibliography and the availability for research of purposes of a collection of the nation’s published works.

International Conferences on Legal Deposit and Bibliographic Control

Wise (1987:304) states that there have been a number of conferences organized to promote bibliographic control, firstly, in 1967 the International Conference on African Bibliography was held in Nairobi and secondly, the SCOLMA (Standing Conference in Library Materials in Africa) held at the Commonwealth Institute in London. These conferences emphasized the importance of bibliographic control and the need to ensure the enactment of effective legal deposit laws. Ng’ang’a notes that the concept of legal Deposit was further popularised through the 1977 Paris International Congress on National Bibliography (ICBN) which came up with recommendations aimed at ensuring that member states had formulated , legislated and implemented legal deposit. These international conventions helped to provide the basis for the establishment of local and international institutions responsible for bibliographic control.

Currently Unesco is on the forefront in promoting bibliographic control and the universal availability of the world’s literary heritage. The International Federation of Library Associations IFLA has also put the concept of bibliographic control on its agenda as it has a section/division (VI) that specifically deals with bibliographic issues. It has also been observed that other countries have also set up Bibliographic Societies like the Royal Bibliographic Society of the United Kingdom. However, in Africa, it has been observed that there is no drive to create such initiative, for example, in Zimbabwe the concept of bibliographic control has not been highly prioritised .Fussler and Kocher (1977:237) noted that there was need for institutions involved in bibliographic control to keep abreast of current trends because some of the concepts of handling bibliographic data are undergoing change as format of library resources also undergo change from print to electronic.

Legal Deposit :Compliance or non-compliance?

Berger and Luckman (1966) noted that according to the social rule theory most human activity was organized and regulated by socially produced and reproduced systems of rules which are manifested in the form of codes of conduct, norms and laws like the Printed Publications Act of Zimbabwe. Laws , norms and codes of conduct are means or mechanisms for social control.Kyobe (2009) notes that compliance is a state in which someone or something is in accordance with established guidelines , specifications or legislation, for example the need to ensure compliance with Printed Publications Act Copyright and Neighbouring Rights Act of Zimbabwe. Grossman and Zaelke (2005) discuss various models or theories that explain compliance namely the rationalist and normative models. The former model focuses on deterrence and enforcement as a means to prevent and punish non-compliance, while the latter encourages cooperation and compliance assistance.

Burns and Flam (1987) note that compliance with or refusals to comply with particular rules are intricate and normative processes. The reasons for compliance are that the issue of benefits versus loses identity and status, authoritative or sacrality, negative or positive sanctions and inherent sanctions among other factors.Kyobe (2009) states that with the normative model compliance is on behavioral motivation and premised on the logic of consequence and logic of appropriateness. In the logic of consequences actors are perceived to choose rationally among alternatives based on their calculations of expected consequences, while with the logic of appropriateness human action is based on identies, obligations and conceptions of appropriateness of action.

Coleman (et.al) (1993) notes that the rationalist model of domestic compliance follows the logic of consequences and emphasizes that regulated individuals act rationally to maximize their economic self interest. The model is anchored on enforcement and deterrence as measures to transform individuals’ economic perceptions but however the model fails to consider social action based on values beliefs and emotions. Coleman (et.al) (1993) further notes that the model also fails to consider the aspect of conflict that arises as a result of lack of symbiotic mutual reciprocity as only one part gains at the expense of the other. The model does not also consider the problems and costs of deterrence.

Grossman (et.al) (2005) notes that the normative theory of compliance is premised on the notion that people obey the law because it is in their best interest but however fails to give explanations for the impact of social factors like culture and perceived legitimacy. It is assumed that laws that are developed with wider consultation and implanted fairly will be complied with if people believe that they are legitimate and fairly applied.Kohleberg (1884) noted that compliance will depend on a number of factors, for example, the capacity of the regulated entity with regards to knowledge and financial and technological abilities and commitment. The models has its shortfalls in that actors need to be conversant with standards and have authority to initiate actions and also in a dynamic environment were change is rapid and complex actors might be overwhelmed and fail to understand their obligations and to comply.

Westra (1997:121) notes that in South Africa the only case to be documented in South Africa‘s legal history was the case between the South African Library and Pippa Skotness from 1993 to 1997.This case is viewed as the only legendary case that South Africa has had to grapple with in the history of South African library services. In this case Skotness refused to comply by arguing that her copies of her expensive book as a work of art rather than a book and the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the South African Library .In Zimbabwe there are no documented cases of cases whereby legal deposit has been flouted despite the lackadaisical approach in enforcement.

Factors are affecting compliance with legislation

Kyobe (2009) notes that there are a number of factors that affects compliance for example, economic factors are manifested in the economic meltdown that characterized Zimbabwe’s economy in 2008 with an inflationary percentage of over two million. The other factors are technological, sociological and psychological, for example, because of the prevailing economic conditions at the time many publishers took advantage of the laxity of institutions responsible for enforcing the legal deposit Act and they felt it worthwhile not to comply yet it is legally wrong and ethically wrong. The failure by the National Archives to publish a National Bibliography and failure to revise and update the penalties for lack of compliance instilled a sense of irresponsibility on part of the actors. Kyobe (2009) notes that were actors are psychological unaware of the legislation there will be non-compliance.

There are various reasons why people comply or fail to comply with a specific piece of legislation, for example people will comply because the law is legitimate and fair and that there are economic benefits to be derived. On the other hand failure to comply might result from the fact that it is not deterrent enough, it lacks legitimacy and those bound by the act do not see any benefits arising from compliance. Lariviere (2000) states that for a law to be effective it needs to be enforceable and that this can be achieved through pressurizing the publisher to comply by means of a penalty structure or clause for contravening the law or some other measure that can deter non –compliance. Lariviere (2000) observed that legislation does not guarantee compliance because there are problems that are associated with enforcement. Lor (2006) note that there is need to consider a number of factors when dealing with enforcement of legal deposit , for example , legal and administrative costs because it is expensive to follow up a case right up to its conclusion.

Legal Deposit in Zimbabwean context

Made notes that the National Archives of Zimbabwe has the legal mandate to act the legal deposit center for the country and this is in accordance with the provisions of the Printed Publications Act. This piece of legislation covers newspapers, periodical or other printed publications published at regular or irregular intervals. The act defines books as “…. every part or division of a book, pamphlet, and sheet of printing, map, plan, chart, or table separately published…” The National Archives falls under the Ministry of Home Affairs. The NAZ library is a legal depository of all printed material produced in Zimbabwe. It also acquires copies of all works published outside the country about Zimbabwe or by Zimbabweans.

The National Archives of Zimbabwe also keeps any material on the Southern African and sub Saharan region that explain or depict the history of, development and any other aspect of the country. Most of these resources need to be digitized so that can be preserved forever and be made readily accessible through interlending and document supply networks. In practice, the National Archives of Zimbabwe serves as the national bibliographic center of Zimbabwe, responsible for the publication of the Zimbabwe National Bibliography (ZNB) and the administration of the International Standard Book Number Scheme (ISBN).

It also serves as the National Repository for UNESCO publications with reference to monographs and serial publications. Genge (2008:3) notes that the Bulawayo Public Library also serves a legal Deposit of printed materials considering that it is the oldest which has helped to sustain the national memory through its historic reference collection dating back as far as the beginning of the twentieth century.Haymes and Rushby (2009) noted that Anglophone countries do not provide the necessary infrastructure to maintain depository libraries and also the fact that the libraries exercised poor bibliographic controls. The two authors also further noted that legal deposit laws were unsatisfactory and difficult to enforce.

Challenges of enforcing legal deposit

Currently many countries have been forced to reexamine their legal deposit acts as a way of dealing with the challenges of digital world. Lariviere(2003) notes that the digital world presents a serious challenge to developing countries because of the complexity of addressing legal, organizational, technical and operational aspects related to the implementation of a legal deposit scheme. Lariviere (2003) observed that Namibia in 1996 and South Africa in 1997 did incorporate electronic publications within their legal deposit legislation even though the legislation deals with offline material. Generally South Africa has had a legal deposit legislation since 1842 and in 1997 and this was revised to extend the legal deposit to audiovisual broadcast electronic media and this was achieved through avoiding definition and enumeration of various media through the use of generic terms like document and media. Lor and Letshela (2006) note that Namibia had the opportunity after independence to enact a modern legal deposit act which covers all existing and to be created media as recommended by UNESCO and this is what is lacking in the current Zimbabwean legislation..

It has been observed that legal deposit of online resources present serious challenges with reference to copyright, authentication, preservation, legal and technical expertise needed to ensure ultimate success of project.Oltemans ( 2003) notes that handling and maintaining electronic resources requires new skills and different infrastructure than that of printed publications and currently there are no best practices pertaining to legal deposit of electronic resources.Tenopir (2003) observed that electronic resources also require the prerequisite hardware for reading electronic resources , for example , e-book readers.

With reference to the South African and Namibian experiences Lor and Letshela observed that the promulgation of act does not entail partial or complete implementation of a legal deposit law because responsible institutions will be overwhelmed to fulfill all the stipulations at one go unless they opt for a gradual approach. This phased approach involved separation of print materials, audio –visual and non-static resources from the dynamic electronic or online resources.

Oltmans(2003) notes that the results of scientific research are currently being published electronically because many publishers feel that they now need to license rather than sell their publications. It is interesting to know that other countries within the Southern African Development Community have already taken the initiative by harmonising the legal deposit laws with Information and Communication Technology, for example, Namibia and South Africa.

Fines as a deterent measure

Jules (2003) notes that it is quite a challenge to rely on goodwill to ensure the comprehensiveness of deposit collections and this calls adequate mechanism to facilitate enforcement, for example, the use of deterrent fines to deter non-compliance would help to improve the situation especially in Zimbabwe were fines are so low and undeterent. The Printed Publications Act of Zimbabwe states that a publisher who fails to comply with the stipulations of Section( 3) will be deemed guilty of an offence and liable to a fine not exceeding five hundred Zimbabwean dollars (Z$500 ) or an imprisonment not exceeding six months or both. In South Africa the maximum penalty stands at R2500, while in the USA It goes as far as US$2, 500.Crews (1988:566) notes that if penalties are too low, they may not be significant enough to compel publishers to comply.

This fine is not deterrent enough because currently the value of the dollar has been eroded by inflation. However the use of fines should be viewed as a last resort because there is need to encourage mutually beneficial close cooperation between national institutions responsible for legal deposit, publishers and other information providers. Lariviere (2003) further states that there is need to educate stakeholders on how the legal deposit act operates and the benefits that accrue from compliance, for example, increased visibility, wider publicity of publications, effective bibliographic control and long term guarantee of availability of original copies in the event that disaster strikes.

Conclusions and recommndations

It has been observed that the Printed Publications Act has ceased to serve the function it was design for because currently there is no National Bibliography and the Act does not address contemporary issues in Information storage and retrieval. It has also been observed that institutions mandated to facilitate legal deposit are failing to adjust to the technological demands of the Information age and this is a disservice to the information profession and to the constitutional right to provide access to information. It is also interesting to note that National Archives of Zimbabwe has now entered into partnerships with educational institutions to help clear the backlog in bibliographic compilation and that for the period from 2010 0nwards electronic resources are part of the institution’s strategic plan

The ability to invest in modern technology for effective bibliographic control will also assist in inter-lending and document supply projects which are dependent upon technology. The advancements in technology have helped libraries and library users to easily identify resources from all over the globe. Bell (2003) hints on “memory losses” in national bibliographies of third world countries and calls for effective strategies to help improve the situation through world-wide cooperation with other institutions like UNESCO, the Africa Union, Association of Southern African Indexers and Bibliographers and IFLA section on bibliographic control.

There is also need to ensure support various stakeholders including publishers , libraries, writers , book sellers and government because currently there is lack of awareness of the importance of national bibliographic control of both print and electronic resources especially among public decision makers.
The National Archives through the support of other stakeholders should lobby government to convener an all stakeholders meeting to tackle the issue of legal deposit in an electronic age
There is need to revisit and revise the Printed Publications Act so that it encompasses both print and no-print resources and to also ensure that institutions mandated to enforce legal deposit are given adequate support materially, financially and economically.
The Zimbabwean institutions responsible for legal deposit should also consider the issues of capacity building because the Southern African region has been experiencing problems of expertise in the area of indexing and bibliographic compilations.
Investment in ICT should be prioritised as Zimbabwe moves forward into the digital world because most scientific publications are now available electronically and quite a significant amount of works by Zimbabweans is available online
Therefore there is need to restrategize on how best Zimbabwe can rely on its legal deposit laws to ensure effective and efficient bibliographic control of both print and electronic resources.
The National Archives should engage in inter-institutional collaboration with Colleges and Universities and other institutions involved in similar work for example , The National Library of South Africa.

An effective legal deposit system will help Zimbabwe contribute to the Universal Bibliographic Control and facilitate the availability and access to published material.Penzhorn (et.al) (2008:113) is of the view that the implementation and management of legal deposit in African countries is dependent upon the positive and full commitment of publishers and legal deposit institutions. Even though Penzhorn‘s studies were mainly focused on South Africa the findings can be generalized to the rest of the African continent. Zimbabwe stands to gain greatly by revisiting the legal deposit law so that revisions can be made and new law that will take into cognisance electronic and other non-print resources should be put in place. The country can afford a memory loss by ignoring the aspect of bibliographic control because the country is already in an information age were everything is dependent upon information and it is imperative that bibliographic control should be taken into consideration.

Bibliography

Jules, L., Guidelines for legal Deposit legislation. A revised, enlarged and updated edition), Paris: UNESCO, 2000.
Lor, P.J. and Letshela, P.Z.Implenting legal deposit of electronic publications in Africa: Progress Report from South Africa and Namibia. Paper presented at the 68th IFLA Council and General conference, 18-24 August, 2002.
Oltmans, E.Legal deposit of digital resources. IN: Liber Quarterly, 2003.
Davidson, D.Bibliographic Control. Clive Bingley: London: 1988.
Fournier, C.”Le depot legal” Vol.39.No.2.Documentation Bibliotheca, 1993
Bell, R.Legal Deposit.(Part 1) IN:Law Librarian.Vol.8.1.5
Wise, M.Aspects of African Librarianship: A collection of writings.London: Mansell Publishing, 1985.p304 -305.
Ng’an’ga, J.M. The concept of UAP and its relevance in Kenya.Paper presented at the KLA Annual seminar, Nairobi, 27th Feb-2nd March , 1990.
Made , S.H.Project in Resource sharing in Southern and Central Africa (Botswana, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe)Feasibility study Part .1[Internet] http:www.unesdoc.unesco/org/images/0008/000851/0081541/eb.pdf.Accessed 7 October , 2009.
Printed Publications Act of Zimbabwe - The Ministry of Home Affairs –Zimbabwe Government .[Internet]Available from http://www.moha.gov.zw/index.php?link=naz_library.Accessed 6 August , 2009.
Genge, P.Historic Reference Collection, Bulawayo Public Library Zimbabwe.IN: From the IFLA round-table on Newspapers, May, 2008.No.8.
Haymes,M.and Rushby, L.Anglophone Africa seminar on Government Information and Official Publications[Internet]Availablehttp://www.innovation.ukzn.ac.za/innovation/Innovation/pdf.Accessed 24 July , 2009
Legal deposit of digital resources.IN: Liber Quarterly, 2003.
Fourie, I (et.al) Bibliographic Control in South Africa.[Internet} Available from http://ifla.queenslibrary.org/IV/ifla73/papers/075-Fourie_Burger-en.pdf.... 15 October, 2009.
Berger, P. L. and T. Luckmann (1966), The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge.New York: Garden City.
Burns, T. and Flam, H(1987) The shaping of social organisation Social Rule System Theory With Applications. London: Sage Publications.
Kyobe, M.Factors Influencing SME compliance with Government Regulations on use of IT:The case of South Africa.IN: Journal of Global Information Management, Vol 17, No.2 .30-59April-June, 2009.
Smith, A.(1999:IV)Why digitise? Washington D.C. Council on library and Information resources.
Westra, P.E. & Lor, P.J. (1993). The national libraries of South Africa: Functions, problems and challenges. Proceedings of the International Conference on National Libraries –Towards the 21st Century, 20–24 April, Taipei. Pretoria: National Central Library.
Westra, P.E. & Zaaiman, R.B.( 1991). The two national libraries of South Africa. Alexan-dria, 3(2): 101 –120.
Fussler, H.H. and Kocher,K.(1977) Contemporary issues in bibliographic control.IN:Library Quarterly, Vol.47.no.3

KM & Social Challenges

Collence takaingnhamo Chisita

libman — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 09:56:26 -0700

THIS PHOTOGRAPH WAS TAKEN IN GERMANY WITH FRIENDS FROM INIST.It IS HIGH TIME INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS SHOULD GO BEYOND THE MUNDANE OR ORDINARY TASK OF DISSEMINATING INFORMATION TO CREATING LINKAGES AND NETWORKS THAT HELP TO STIMULATE SOCIO-DEVELOPMENT.INFORMATIONIS POER IF ONLY THOSE WHO HAVE IT CAN UTILISE TO CHANGE THE LIVES OF THOSE AROUND THEM FOR THE BETTER.I STRONGLY BELIEVE IN THE IMMENSE POTENTIAL OF INFORMATION TO TRANSFORM OUR SOCIETIES TO CREATE FREE SPACES WERE PEOPLE CAN INTERACT WITHOUT REGARDS TO RACIAL, BARRIERS.

KM & Social Challenges

KMAfrica.com KnowledgeHub Greetings

KMAadmin — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 08:16:07 -0700

Zulu culture, language & traditions

Knowledge for Health - www.k4health.org

K4Health — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 01:59:44 -0700

The mission of K4Health is to increase the use and dissemination of evidence-based, accurate and up-to-date information to improve health service delivery and health outcomes worldwide. CKM4Health's current knowledge management activities include:

Collectively developing “toolkits” of up-to-date and evidence-based resources that make information easy to find and easy to use;
Adapting existing toolkit knowledge resources for local and regional use;
Developing new toolkit resources—articles, guides, curricula, fact sheets, job aids, and eLearning courses;
Encouraging feedback about toolkit resources through discussion boards;
Sponsoring global, regional, and country-level forums;
Providing free online and offline eLearning courses on a variety of health topics; and
Supporting virtual networks among health care professionals, communities of practice, and technical working groups.

The U.S. Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Office of Global Health funds the K4Health project, which is implemented by The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Communication Programs (CCP), Family Health International (FHI), and Management Sciences for Health (MSH).

Further information and toolkits are available on K4Health website

KM & Communications

GLOBAL KNOWLEDGE TOWARDS 2012

Md Santo — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 18:40:15 -0700

GLOBAL KNOWLEDGE TOWARDS 2012 or “CONTINUUM OF PHYSICAL REALITY WITH KNOWLEDGE AND BEYOND : GREAT TURNING FROM MIND BRAIN TO CONSCIOUSNESS DNA” (see the Attachment) showing global trends towards 2012 in which the domain of Knowledge evolved in continuum universe as emergent behavior within human body as complex (adpative) system, having consciousness and free will (mind and value) as well as behaving dynamically as subject

A brief description about the sentence ..."After Singularity between Human Mind and Technology reaching its peak (in 2012 ?)"... :
"Singularity" here means the phenomenon of the race between smartness of Human and Technology (Machine) which is at present occured exponentially and exponentially at very tremendous speed and will reaching its peak around the year 2012. To cope this situation, Human as Complex Adaptive System will migrate or making "great turning" from Brain as "center of play making in science or scientific knowledge" (locus of Mind) to the DNA as "new center" (locus of Consciousness). This migration or "great turning" will give impressive impact on how Human manage the Science and Technology. In this circumstances, it will appropriate if we put or coin a new term called as "Knowledgeable Science" which is entirely different with Scientific Knowledge as commonly used. (Consciousness) DNA as new vital locus will certainly has a higher level than the (Mind) Brain as former human vital locus.

To get more comprehensive insight, should you visit also :

http://isivivane.com/kmafrica/forum.hybrid.definition.of.knowledge - "We are the knowledge: a hybrid definition of knowledge"
http://mobeeknowledge.ning.com/forum/topics/next-generation-of-knowledge - "NEXT GENERATION OF KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT (KM)"
http://mobeeknowledge.ning.com/forum/topics/five-basic-implications-of-n... - "FIVE BASIC IMPLICATIONS OF NEW PARADIGM OF KNOWLEDGE"
http://mobeeknowledge.ning.com/forum/topics/knowledge-towards-2012-great - "KNOWLEDGE TOWARDS 2012 : GREAT TURNING FROM MIND BRAIN TO CONSCIOUSNESS DNA"

Tourism Knowledge SIG

Harnessing Knowledge to Promote HIV Prevention in Southern Africa

K4Health — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 06:43:12 -0700

New HIV infections have been reduced by 17% over the past eight years, according to a joint report released today from UNAIDS and WHO. Needless to say, there is much to be proud of as we mark the 21st anniversary of World AIDS Day. However, as we take time today to reflect on the struggles and successes of the past three decades, it’s important we also prepare for the battles to come.

Executive Director of UNAIDS Michel Sidibé said, “The good news is that we have evidence that the declines we are seeing are due, at least in part, to HIV prevention.” He added, “However, the findings also show that prevention programming is often off the mark and that if we do a better job of getting resources and programs to where they will make most impact, quicker progress can be made and more lives saved.”

To help program managers and others hit that mark, K4Health in partnership with the USAID/Southern Africa Regional Program (RHAP) is strengthening knowledge management (KM) initiatives in the region. The Knowledge for Health Southern Africa (K4HSA) program will facilitate knowledge capturing, synthesis, and sharing among audiences who work in the response against HIV/AIDS across Southern Africa. Something that we believe will promote the use and scale-up of best practices, lead to better results, and ultimately save more lives.

We have also identified local partners to participate in the regional KM initiative, and alliances and synergies have been developed with partners, including AIDSPortal, Soul City, Soul Beat, PSI, and UNAIDS. SAfAIDS was also identified to become the operational partner of K4HSA in the region.

In addition to our work in Southern Africa, K4Health is excited to announce the publication of two toolkits related to HIV prevention, including:

* Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission (http://www.k4health.org/node/361)
* Multiple and Concurrent Partnerships (http://www.k4health.org/toolkits/MCP)

We also have toolkits on condom use and family planning and HIV integration in the pipeline.

Our toolkits (http://www.k4health.org/toolkits) are developed from the collaborative efforts of working groups worldwide, and they capture the best knowledge surrounding a particular topic. They also allow individuals to comment and suggest other resources, including grey literature. By facilitating virtual collaboration, we hope to tap into the online collectivism around HIV prevention and create the best repositories of information that live on and evolve for people on the front lines.

Would you like to learn more about the integration of HIV/AIDS and sexual and reproductive health? Visit our resource page (http://www.hivandsrh.org/) to see the featured resources, events, or join a discussion. Our funder USAID also released a very informative newsletter, “Working Together in the Fight Against HIV/AIDS,” (http://www.usaid.gov/our_work/global_health/home/News/enewsletter/index....) that we encourage you to visit.

Philippe LeMay, Deputy Director
http://www.k4health.org

Fireside Chat

Strategic Considerations for Strengthening the Linkages between Family Planning and HIV/AIDS Policies, Programs, and Services

carol — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:04:25 -0600

Many governmental and nongovernmental public health agencies are pursuing and, in some cases, scaling up programs that integrate family planning (FP) and HIV services. In response to calls from public-health decision makers for guidance on FP/HIV integration, the World Health Organization, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and Family Health International developed Strategic Considerations for Strengthening the Linkages between Family Planning and HIV/AIDS Policies, Programs, and Services.

The partners drew from publications, the recommendations of more than 100 experts in FP and HIV/AIDS, and lessons learned from field experience. The document is designed to help program planners, implementers, and managers -- including government officials and other country-level stakeholders -- make appropriate decisions about whether to pursue the integration of FP and HIV services. It also explains how to pursue integration in a strategic and systematic manner, in order to achieve maximum public health benefit.

The document places four questions at the center of FP/HIV integration policy:

What type of service integration, if any, is needed?
To what extent should services be integrated?
What steps are needed to establish and sustain high-quality integrated services?
What information is needed to measure program success and inform program/service delivery improvement, replication, and/or scale-up?

The document guides readers through the process of finding answers to these questions that are appropriate to their countries' circumstances. Where integration appears to be the right course of action, the document helps readers identify action steps to establish or enhance integrated FP/HIV services. It also provides links to resources that will support the implementation of those action steps, such as facility assessment tools, training curricula, and job aids.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Restoring lives and landscapes

carol — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 06:18:25 -0600

This booklet tells the story of a project that has had a profound influence on the management of four large forest areas in Guinea. The Landscape Management for Improved Livelihoods (LAMIL) project has also done much to improve the welfare of local people. Indeed, the two - better forest management and improved livelihoods - are inextricably linked.

The World Agroforestry Centre, the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and their partners in the LAMIL project have developed a system of co-management, involving local communities and government agencies, which is generating considerable interest in Guinea and throughout the region.

Not long ago, these forests were managed by government agencies. Local people were forbidden from using them. As a result, the forests were widely abused, and the authorities were able to do little to stem the tide of illegal logging, poaching and land
clearance. Under co-management, in contrast, local people derive real benefits from the forests, and in return they have shown their willingness, and ability, to manage them sustainably.

Author Charlie Pye-Smith

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

The water debate

storytelling — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 09:03:06 -0600

Water is vital to life. It is the essential component in all aspects and activities related to our well-being and existence – including food and energy production and manufacturing in general. It’s clear that if our water supply continues to dwindle, and/or, if water became unaffordable, our lives would be detrimentally transformed. Billions of people are already experiencing and suffering from the mismanagement and unequal allocation of water. Between 1.1 and 1.5 billion people in the world lack access to safe drinking water and 2.6 billion people lack access to basic sanitation. 2.2 million people die each year due to low quality drinking water and/or lack of sanitation – that is 42,000 people per week, 90 percent of whom are children (WHO/UNICET:2005). Exclusion to socially necessary goods and services such as fresh water has horrific consequences that are catastrophic, yet entirely preventable.

The struggle over fresh water goods and services has taken the form of a conflict over increasing commercialisation, privatisation and liberalisation. This struggle takes place in an era of economic globalisation where neoliberal policies transform all forms of social reproduction so that all goods and services that were once held in common (things such as fresh water, education and healthcare etc.) are increasingly exposed to the free market and in many cases transformed into a form of private property. This regulatory shift – from public to private – is by no means inevitable. The processes that facilitate this shift are a direct result of political and corporate elites exercising their power and will, through an organised network of connections, in order to achieve the free market conditions that are necessary to expand the reach of capital.

Fireside Chat

Generic guidelines for mainstreaming drylands issues into National Development Frameworks

carol — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 01:59:43 -0600

The Generic Drylands Mainstreaming Guidelines have been developed by the UNDP-DDC in close collaboration with the UNEP and UNDP/Global Environment Facility (GEF) Global Support Unit. This document provides broad generic steps for mainstreaming environment and drylands issues into national development frameworks, as well lessons drawn from various countries on environment and drylands mainstreaming.

It is important for the implementation of poverty reduction strategies and the achievement of the MDGs to take into account drylands issues and challenges, especially how they impact the poorest communities. These communities have the lowest per capita GDP and the highest infant mortality rates. The combination of high variability in environmental conditions and relatively high levels of poverty leads to situations where human populations can be extremely sensitive to changes in the ecosystem. If drylands are not mainstreamed, they will lose out in resource allocation. These guidelines have been developed with the aim of influencing action at several levels of planning and policy engagement, because it is necessary to make drylands visible at all levels.

The guidelines have been informed by lessons drawn from 21 countries on mainstreaming environment into development frameworks with a particular focus on drylands issues, and by a review made of other international organizations’ guidelines on the same subject. This concerted action will create the synergistic and critical pressure needed to put and keep drylands issues at a place of importance on the developmental agenda.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & the Environment

Women's Sexual and Reproductive Health Risk Index for Sub-Saharan Africa

carol — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 05:45:57 -0600

In 2008 the number of African women who died from pregnancy and child birth was much higher than the number of casualties from all the major conflicts in Africa combined. Maternal mortality continues to be the major cause of death among women of reproductive age (15-49) in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Most of these women die from complications that can often be effectively treated in a health system that has adequate skilled personnel, a functioning referral system and can respond to obstetric emergencies when they occur.

This report from Population Action International looks at the performance of Sub-Saharan African countries in meeting reproductive health targets in 47 countries and ranks them using a set of ten indicators in order of the highest to lowest risk. It highlights the need to increase the level of investment in reproductive health, step up policy reform and implementation, expand access to services in rural areas, strengthen health systems, promote the realization of rights and abolish retrogressive cultural practices that perpetuate gender inequities and put the lives of women and girls at risk.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Institutionalizing Evaluation - review of international experience

carol — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 00:44:33 -0600

Policy-makers are experimenting with billion’s of people’s lives on a daily basis without informed consent, and without rigorous evidence that what they do works, has no substantive adverse effects, and could not be achieved more efficiently through other means. In this context, carefully designed and implemented evaluations have the potential to save lives and improve people’s welfare. However, to date evaluations have tended to be selected based on the availability of data, the interest of researchers and donors, and the availability of funds rather than on their potential contribution to broader development strategies. For this reason, the institutionalization of quality evaluation is necessary in order to turn it into an optimal tool for policy-making. This report looks at the experiences of institutionalizing government evaluation efforts and considers the lessons learnt for countries starting down that road.

This report compares experiences of institutionalizing government evaluation efforts through a discussion of the three leading models in Latin America – Mexico, Colombia and Chile - the non-centralized system of monitoring and evaluation adopted in South Africa, and the policylearning approach taken in China. Some developed country and international experiences are also
briefly presented.

The case of Mexico: the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Policy, CONEVAL
The case of Colombia: the National System for Evaluation and Management for Results, SINERGIA
The case of Chile: the Management Control Division at DIPRES
The Case of South Africa: the Government-Wide Monitoring and Evaluation System
The case of China: the state of current evaluation efforts

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

UNFPA Toolkit Focuses on Women, Population and Climate Change

carol — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 03:11:18 -0600

© UNFPA, WEDO14 October 2009: The UN Population Fund (UNFPA), together with the Women's Environment and Development Organization (WEDO), has launched a resource kit on climate change connections, focusing on gender and population and advocating that women are uniquely positioned as innovators, educators, caretakers, leaders and agents of change to address the risks of a changing climate.

The resource kit provides policy guidance, finance and adaptation plans, advocacy tools and best practices related to increasing educational opportunities for girls, economic opportunities for women, and access to reproductive health and family planning, recognizing their role in reducing vulnerability to climate change. Women, population and climate change are the focus of the UNFPA's flagship report, State of World Population, to be released on 18 November 2009. UNFPA Resource Kit: Climate Change Connections - Gender and Population https://www.unfpa.org/public/site/global/lang/en/pid/4028

Climate Change Connections

UNFPA and WEDO have developed a comprehensive resource kit on gender, population and climate change. Learn how gender equality can reduce vulnerability to climate change impacts and how women are uniquely positioned to help curb the harmful consequences of a changing climate.

Climate change is already impacting populations and ecosystems around the globe. Exacerbating poverty and leading to infrastructural breakdown, it threatens to set back development efforts by decades, profoundly affecting all of us.

But the impact won't be felt equally. Those with the fewest resources will be most susceptible to its negative effects - particularly women, the majority of the world's poor. At the same time, women's vulnerability can obscure the fact that they are an untapped resource in efforts to cope with the effects of climate change and reduce the emissions that cause it. As innovators, organizers, leaders, educators and caregivers, women are uniquely positioned to help curb the harmful consequences of a changing climate. Incorporating a gender perspective into climate change policies, projects and funds is crucial in ensuring that women contribute to and benefit from equitable climate solutions.

Overview: Women at the Forefront https://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/documents/publications/2...
Policy that Supports Gender Equality https://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/documents/publications/2...
Common Ground: In Bangladesh, Ghana, Nepal, Senegal and Trinidad and Tobago https://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/documents/publications/2...
Making NAPAs Work for Women https://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/documents/publications/2...
Financing that Makes a Difference https://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/documents/publications/2...
Educate and Advocate https://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/documents/publications/2009/climateconnections_6_advocacy.pdf

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & the Environment

Sex Politics. Reports from the Front Lines

carol — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 00:09:27 -0600

This publication from GTZ can be used as an instrument for the application of concepts, approaches and methods for transforming unequal gender relations. Each topic is introduced by a short outline of the issue, followed by subsequent steps of action. A project example illustrates the application of the method in a selected sociocultural context.

From the introduction:

"Gender equality is a necessary element to secure sustainable livelihoods of women, men and their children. Gender Equality is not only a goal in itself, but is also necessary to achieve all eight Millennium Development Goals. In particular, gender equality will ensure success in the areas of poverty alleviation, environmental sustainability, HIV/AIDS, child mortality, maternal health and primary education. Many international, regional and national agreements foreground the importance of gender equality to development cooperation, in donor- and partner countries. In their daily work, actors and stakeholders can refer to the following documents:

Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (1979)
Beijing Platform for Action (1995)
Millennium Development Declaration (2000)
UN-Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security (2000)
Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality (2004)
BMZ Concept for the Promotion of Equal Participation by Women and Men in Development Process (2001/05)
UN-Resolution 1820 on Sexual Violence against Civilians in Conflict (2008)
Accra Agenda for Action (2008)
BMZ Genderaktionsplan (2009)

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

The impact of a community-based pilot health education intervention for older people as caregivers of orphaned and sick children

carol — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 23:58:58 -0600

Authors: Boon H; Ruiter RA; James S; Van Den Borne B; Williams E; Reddy P
Institution: Health Promotion Research and Development Unit, Medical Research Council, Cape Town, South Africa
Source: Journal of Cross-cultural Gerontology 8 Oct 2009; doi 10.1007/s10823-009-9101-2. [Epub ahead of print]

ABSTRACT

The increasing HIV and AIDS epidemic in South Africa poses a substantial burden to older people, in particular older women who mainly provide care for sick adult children and their grandchildren who have become orphaned and rendered vulnerable by the death or illness of their parents. In this study, 202 Xhosa speaking older caregivers from Motherwell in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa were trained to provide care for grandchildren and adult children living with HIV or AIDS. Based on a community needs assessment, a health education intervention comprising four modules was designed to improve skills and knowledge which would be used to assist older people in their care-giving tasks. Some topics were HIV and AIDS knowledge, effective intergenerational communication, providing home-based basic nursing care, accessing social services and grants, and relaxation techniques. Structured one-on-one interviews measured differences between pre-intervention and post-intervention scores among those who attended all four modules vs. those that missed one or more of the sessions. The results demonstrated that older people who participated in all four workshops perceived themselves more able and in control to provide nursing care. The participants also showed a more positive attitude towards people living with HIV or AIDS and reported an increased level of HIV and AIDS knowledge. The results provided valuable information upon which the development of future interventions may be based and psychosocial and structural needs of the older caregivers may be addressed by relevant stakeholders.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Population and reproductive health in National Adaptation Programmes of Action

carol — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 06:56:23 -0600

By : Clive Mutunga and Karen Hardee

This paper reviews 41 National Adaptation Programmes of Action (NAPAs) submitted by Least Developed Countries (LDCs) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and identifies the range of interventions included in countries’ priority adaptation actions. The review found near-universal recognition among the NAPAs of the importance of population considerations as a central pillar in climate change adaptation.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & the Environment

Sexuality and life skills: participatory activities on sexual reproductive health with young people

carol — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 02:48:02 -0600

Produced by: International HIV/AIDS Alliance (2008)

This toolkit is a result of team work between sexual and reproductive health practitioners working with young people in Zambia, Malawi Zimbabwe and Uganda. It is written for anyone who wants to facilitate participatory learning activities with young people to equip them with knowledge, positive attitudes and skills to grow up and enjoy sexual and reproductive health and well- being.

The toolkit's intended audience includes peer educators, outreach workers, school teachers and community workers. It covers themes on community mobilisation, gender and sexuality, prevention, reproductive health, stigma and discrimination. The educational approach to behavioural change used in the toolkit is based on the belief that people actively learn through participatory problem solving activities related to their own lives.

Specifically the tool aims to assist facilitators to:

provide accurate and complete factual information to young people
plan appropriate and educational activities for groups of young people that enable them to analyse their own situations, resources and needs
apply new knowledge to their own lives
increase awareness of their own values and attitudes
develop their self esteem and confidence
develop life skills for example communication and assertiveness skills, problem solving and decision making
build trust and take collective action as a group
follow up and evaluate their work

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Impact of the financial crisis on infant deaths in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2009

carol — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 02:19:11 -0600

The human consequences of the current global financial crisis for the developing world are presumed to be severe, yet few studies have quantified such impact. Using Demographic and Health surveys from 30 countries as well as IMF growth shortfall projections, Jed Friedman and Norbert Schady estimate that 30,000 to 50,000 more infant deaths will occur in Sub-Saharan Africa this year. Most of these additional deaths are likely to be poorer children born to women in rural areas with lower education levels, and are overwhelmingly female. If the crisis continues to worsen the number of deaths may grow much larger, especially of girls. Policies that protect the income of poor households and that maintain critical health services during times of economic contraction should be considered. Interventions targeted at female infants and young girls may be particularly beneficial. Policy Research Working Paper 5023

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Dryland opportunities - A new paradigm for people, ecosystems and development

carol — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 03:55:06 -0600

Drylands cover 41 percent of the earth’s terrestrial surface. The urgency of and international response to climate change have given a new place to drylands in terms both of their vulnerability to predicted climate change impacts and their potential contribution to climate change mitigation. This book aims to apply the new scientific insights on complex dryland systems to practical options for development. A new dryland paradigm is built on the resources and capacities of dryland peoples, on new and emergent economic opportunities, on inward investment, and on the best support that dryland science can offer.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & the Environment

The role of traditional and indigeneous knowledge and technology: the citizens engagement

storytelling — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 05:57:23 -0600

By Prof. Joseph O. Malo. KNAS and University of Nairobi

Abstract

The paper examines the role of traditional and indigenous knowledge and technology including the role of citizens in knowledge management of sustainable environment, health, water resources, education, habitat, disaster and emergency response, food security, clean energy etc.

The motivating factor is that most of the villages in developing countries are small and literally cut off from the rest of the world and hence under serviced. Social services particularly in health must therefore promote a combination of traditional and scientific approach. This calls for recognition of people who apply natural and traditional methods to sustain life.

One of the main bottle-neck in technology transfer is the current approach of the trickle-down effect rather than participatory bottom up approach where citizens are considered not just as partial beneficiaries but knowledgeable, active and centrally involved in both the upstream design and downstream delivery systems.

Background and Major Constraints

The key problem Africa is facing today is under-development that manifests itself in terms of abject poverty, diseases, ignorance and many other forms. It is regrettable to recognize and note that due to the severe but apparent lack of funds and other resources, many African counties have remained impoverished over the years. The weak fiscal status and the dim prospects for drastic economic improvement coupled with mismanagement, corruption in the continent also militate against any significant local support to alleviate the problems of under-development in the near future. From the experience of the industrialized countries it has become abundantly clear that for Africa to develop and survive this century, science, technology and innovation must take root in the continent to serve the people and improve productivity.

Global Environmental Change refers to a set of transformations of land, oceans and atmosphere driven by an interwoven system of socioeconomic and natural processes. Thus concurrent with the modern phenomena of globalization and to some extent as a consequence, human have begun to induce planetary-scale changes in earth’s life support systems.

Today human activities already match and sometimes exceed natural forces that regulate the earth systems. Current levels of carbon dioxide and methane are already well outside the range of natural variability over the years. Humans also now fix more nitrogen than nature dues. Furthermore particles emitted by human activities alter the energy balance of the planet as well as have adverse effects on human health.

It is however encouraging to note that the earth system is a very complex system with very many feedbacks to the extent that it can presumably still exhibit rapid global scale responses to changes in environmental conditions. However, a consequence of the interconnectedness of the coupled human environmental earth systems is that no region is independent of the rest of the world. For example the process at wok in the African region namely desertification and, biomass burning can have global consequences in the same way processes occurring in other regions can have influences in Africa such as particulate emissions from other continents affect rainfall patterns in Sub-Saharan Africa. Thus Global Environmental research in Africa requires not only Africa Scientists but also inputs from Scientists from outside the region. We are all interdependent.

It is therefore imperative that Global Warming and Climate Change that is real must be adequately addressed to bring sustainable development down to earth. To achieve this noble goal, traditional and indigeneous knowledge and technology including citizens engagement must be fully incorporated in the process of socio-economic development and more so in the developing world.

Science, Technology and Innovation Policy

It is today generally accepted that technology is “ the engine of economic growth” and technological innovation is indeed the principal currency of international competition. Thus technology plays a key role in attaining major goals in invigorating countries competitiveness in the global market place. For example the secondary applications of aerospace technology –spin-offs- span so broad a range of public needs and conveniences that is almost impossible to find an area of everyday life they have not improved and thus collectively represent a substantial dividend on the national investment in technology research.

A science and technology policy should therefore aim at improving the effectiveness of a national system of innovation, supporting public research and education, and sustaining the competitiveness of the business sector. So a major policy area should therefore focus on the promotion of innovation and investment, the diffusion of advanced technologies and creation of new firms. Thus a mechanism must be put in place for funding technological innovation by providing grants, low-interest loans and risk capital for supporting individual and cooperative research projects including downstream innovation that will mitigate the effects global warming and climate change.

Capacity Building

The highly interdisciplinary nature and mutuality of science in the development of new technology evolved mainly out of the capitalization on the solid foundation in science in the aspects of technology innovation, development and diffusion. Despite all the trailblazing advancements, our society is still experiencing an imbalance in improving literacy of citizens with the scientific technology development process, that has serious implications for public policy formulations, especially for developing countries.

Thus for Africa to enjoy the full benefit of Science and Technology they must be deemed critical to our effort to achieve economic well-being and indeed, social justice integrated into societal decision making structure and systematically supported by actions that nurture the nation’s capacities and indigenous talent/knowledge.

Since many of the urgent problems facing humanity today have potential solution derived from science and technology, it is vital that science and technology become part of the mainstream of education system. Thus courses that provide the basis of science and technology literacy and reasonable literacy and familiarity with scientific and technological culture, should be required at all levels and for all students including the many who do not intend to specialize in science and technology. This will create a science culture for a knowledge based society of the future.

Regarding Science Education we need to urgently introduce Inquiry-based Science Education (IBSE) at least from Pre- primary to primary school level. The conduct of science is also increasingly affected and indeed, driven by economic and other societal concerns .It is therefore necessary for the scientific community to be conscious of the concerns of the societies. Research agenda priorities derive not just from the wishes of scientists or their interest in certain problems, but from factors such as national needs, the availability of funding, access to tools of research and commercial prospects for deploying the resulting technologies such that almost always what get studied is decided by non-scientists.

Since the indigenous professionals generally understand their nation’s culture, they can easily communicate with it’s people. That is, they are uniquely placed to be disseminators of advanced knowledge and know-how to other critical local actors. This will greatly increase the likelihood that the new technologies will be well adapted to that society’s needs and cultures. The public can become sensitized on the important role of Science and Technology in society and their potential to help to solve urgent problems. A society that has become increasingly more dependent upon Science and Technology requires more professional scientists, more technically trained professionals and more citizens literate in science and technology who can make intelligent decisions on the increasing number questions of public policy with a technical component.

A nation that is involved in development, production or use of new technologies such as those deriving from biotechnology and bioengineering, should have the means to access and manage their benefits and risks. It is obvious that independent scientific advice improves decision making for public policies in terms of formulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation. The effective government programmes can be greatly improved if inputs and independent review are provided by scientific, engineering and health experts. These are honest brokers who bridge the gap between what is technically possible and politically achievable. We know that many international deliberations from intellectual property rights to environmental and health regulations require governments to fully understand the science and technology premises that underlie the decisions they are negotiating. It is therefore vital that we create suitable mechanisms for providing important scientific and technological advice to government policy makers. That will also mitigate the effect of global warming and climate change.

Our governments must therefore ensure that indigeneous science and technology capacities are in place not only for adoption of new technology but also for helping in implementing public health, human safety and environmental guidelines or regulations that address potential side effects of new technologies. The possibilities of long term effects must be kept in mind when setting up such systems which must remain fully adaptable to rapid advances in scientific and engineering knowledge. It is therefore highly desirable that there be coordination of such efforts among nations to permit the sharing of the experiences and standardization of some of the risk assessments.

Traditional and Indigeneous Knowledge and Technology

There is no doubt that traditional and indigeneous knowledge and technology, particularly in the developing world, can enhance and indeed play decisive role in the management of sustainable environment, health, water resources, education, habitat, disaster and emergency response, food security, clean energy etc. In this paper, I will however focus only on health.

Plenty of our villages are small and literally cut off from the world and under-serviced. Most are subsistence farmers and indeed live below poverty line. The children are under and malnourished and at risk of preventable diseases.
We must expand social services for these people who are particularly disadvantaged in remote villages. The few government institutions that exist are far away and most are under equipped, including lack of staff. In any case they are often beyond the reach of those without money. Needless to point out that young doctors prefer working in towns. In addition to this, language barriers and cultural differences make communication even more difficult.

Social services particular in health, we must promote a combination of traditional and scientific methods during training of all cadres of medical personnel. The so called healers should first impart basic knowledge of scientific, natural and dental care including sexual and reproductive health.

We must urgently start supporting people who manufacture and use natural healing methods and recognize the potential of traditional medicine. As a first step, we should compile a handbook that will indicate disease patterns, diagnosis and cure including details of identification and the correct way to use medicinal plants.

We should then use media such as Radio and TV that feature interviews including public lectures that are informed and knowledge based. This programme could give information on symptoms and report on how to prevent and cure illnesses. Last but not least train two or more people in each village.

Citizen Engagement

It has become imperative that high- tech promotion should be of particular interest for developing countries because research in this areas has the general advantage that leads and require technological advancement in the frontier fields that will produce important spin-offs on the development of a country in which it is performed. Thus only knowledge based on local realities and environment can resolve the appropriateness of an imported technology to the community and turn them into new products and services that address national and local needs.

Citizen engagement is vital to ensure Science, Technology and Innovation respond to the challenges of international development agenda that includes Global Warming, Climate Change, Bioengineering and Biotechnology. There are many pathways to poverty reduction including social, cultural and institutional dimension that are key. This is so because Science, Technology and Innovation should be perceived as a part of a bottom-up participating process of development where citizen themselves are centre stage. Instead of citizen being viewed as passive beneficiaries of trickle-down development of technology transfer, they be considered as knowledgeable, active and centrally involved in both upstream choice and design of technologies and indeed their downstream delivery and regulation.

How about the following issues (1) What role can technologies play in future of people in developing world (2) How can poor people become more involved in shaping their own technological future (3) What makes Science and Technology to work for the poor (4) Which forces will be involved in shaping this (5) How can those who work in science and development assist and (6) How and where should Research and Development funds be directed

One of the main bottleneck of acceptance of new technologies currently is how risk and uncertainties arising from technological applications are regulated. In this connection the marginalized people should be involved in decision about innovation and technology. Thus it is time to adopt a new vision of citizenship that goes beyond public engagement with science encompassing, how science and technology agendas are framed, and the social purpose they serve and, who stands to gain or lose from them.

Conclusion

Thus advances in Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) should not neglect the poor people’s own priorities in trickle - down model since this approach will ignore poor people’s own perspective and concerns. For these technologies to provide well being for the citizens, innovation must be rooted in the local realities. Thus more participatory approach is needed where innovation are seen as part of broader system of governance and markets that extends from local to national , regional and international levels . No doubt this will increase access and indeed ownership for sustainability.

I have tried above to present historical perspective of the development of science and then not only to underscore but also to underpin policy issues and capacity building together with citizen engagement for sustainability in order to guarantee achieving both goals and the desired result. My conclusion is that it is vital to ensure well being of the society than so called wealth creation by providing the necessary infrastructure and an enabling environment. I have no doubt that Science, Technology and Innovation will make lasting contribution in these efforts to by engaging citizens and incorporating of traditional and indigeneous knowledge and technology.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Malo J. O., Physics and Industrial Development, 3rd Regional ANSTI Seminar in Physics, 5 – 7 August, Gaborone, Botswana
Malo J. O., Capacity building in Science and Technology :The African perspective, International Conference on Physics and Industrial Development- Bridging the Gap, 17- 19 January ,1994, New Delhi , India
Malo J. O., Physics in Africa World Congress of Physical Societies, 17- 22 September 2000
Malo J. O., Major constraints in Application of Science and Technology in National Development- The African Perspective, COPID 200, Durban, South Africa, 4-7 September 2000
Malo J. O., Physics in Contemporary World: The African Perspective: Third World Congress of Physical Societies, Berlin, Germany 15- 16 December 2000
ICSU, Report on New Genetics, Food and Agriculture: Scientific Discoveries – Societal Dilemmas, 2003
Inter Academy Council (IAC), Inventing a Better Future: A Strategy for Building Worldwide Capabilities in Science and Technology, January 2004
Prof. E. O. Odada, A Strategy for Global Environmental Change Research in Africa : Science Plan and Implementation Strategy, 2000 PASS Secretariat, Nairobi, Kenya.
Malo J. O., Technology Development and Citizen Engagement; Career Development in Bioengineering and Biotechnology, 2008, USNAS

KM & Governance

Small Livestock Information Portal

storytelling — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 06:09:30 -0600

Livestock in general, and smallstock in particular (including sheep, goats and poultry) have an important role to play in enhancing the livelihoods of the poor.

In poor households, these animals are often kept under scavenging conditions with little or no attention paid to supplementing feed inputs, or to disease control and housing. At the same time, these animals provide products for cash sale when a need arises, and provide the household with much needed protein.

The Smallstock in Development toolbox focuses on the role and importance of smallstock in development and poverty reduction. The toolbox also aims to provide a range of practical information and descriptions of techniques or "tools" to assist in increasing the efficiency of operations of smallholders and/or the productivity of their animals. The Smallstock in Development toolbox is available at smallstock.info

KM & Social Challenges

Managing waters across boundaries, wetland assessment & reforming water governance

carol — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 02:49:12 -0600

1. Share: Managing waters across boundaries

This publication provides an overview of the world’s shared water resources and insights for managing these resources. Using case studies from around the world, it describes the benefits to be gained from cooperation and the challenges of constructing legal frameworks, institutions, management processes and financing and partnership strategies to govern transboundary waters equitably and sustainably.

2. Assess : Integrated Wetland Assessment Toolkit

For billions of people throughout the world, especially the rural poor, wetlands are critical for livelihoods, providing vital supplies of water, food and materials as well as ecological services. Wetlands are, however, suffering from extreme levels of degradation with estimates putting wetland loss and drainage in some parts of the world at more than 50%. Such a high level of wetland degradation not only results in a tragic loss of the wetland species but is also impacting heavily on those people whose livelihoods depend upon wetlands. There are also significant losses to national and regional economies resulting from the loss of hydrological services, such as flood control and water purification, and of material goods such as those provided through fisheries.

3. Rule: reforming water governance

This toolkit will introduce readers to the central role played by policy, law and institutions in designing and implementing good governance for water resources. It will guide users through approaches to reforming water governance, including useful mechanisms for incorporating environmental considerations into water laws and policies. It is intended for use by water professionals, working in water management, who do not have a law background.

4. Conserve: Conservation for a new era

Conversation alone cannot deliver conservation on the ground. Not even good conversation. Good conservation outcomes need hard work, mainly in the field. A conservationist’s life is long hours of travelling to get there, longer hours of observation, even longer hours of analysis, deep thought and synthesis – and then more hours in the laboratory and the library, documenting and communicating. This does not mean that a life in conservation is tedious; on the contrary, its very nature is fun – but its primary fun is in nature.

Nevertheless, as for all professions, advancement of knowledge in conservation depends on sharing, critiquing, questioning, refining and honing ideas from research and for action through interaction with colleagues and peers from related and other disciplines. Modern communications have revolutionized the possibilities for such sharing but ultimately there is no substitute for physical encounters where researchers and practitioners can meet and exchange information on what they are doing.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Migrant children in South Africa

carol — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 03:58:31 -0600

What is the legal and policy framework governing the provision of rights to migrant children in South Africa? What institutional capacity exists for responding to the needs of children who are affected by migration? What level of access to services do child migrants enjoy and what are the barriers to effective access? These questions frame this paper which gives an overview of the situation of children affected by migration into South Africa. It focuses on cross-border migrants who migrate alone, with adult caregivers or who remain behind when their caregivers migrate.

The report begins by outlining the policy framework that should guide migrant children’s access to rights in South Africa. It continues by reviewing existing studies on child migration with a view to identifying children’s access to their rights as well as pointing to gaps in information. Research on child migrants indicates very poor implementation of the legal and policy framework and significant abuses of migrant children’s rights. In particular, children are often left behind when caregivers migrate and face a range of vulnerabilities associated with this. In addition, children are migrants in their own right and the existing research indicates that, where children migrate alone, they are particularly vulnerable to exploitative working conditions, violence and denial of basic rights.

There is however a lack of capacity for intervention with child migrants in South Africa. Many of the migrant rights organisations that exist do not specifically address the rights of children and many children’s organisations lack the knowledge on migrant children’s rights to intervene effectively. Access to rights is almost entirely facilitated by NGOs in South Africa with migrant children having very limited direct access to government departments and services.

The report shows that the policy and legal framework in South Africa is supportive of children’s access to basic rights regardless of their documentation status. Nevertheless, in the implementation of these rights there is frequently a denial of services or confusion about the rights of different categories of migrants. It offers the following recommendations:

Further research is needed into the following areas:

children living outside of urban centres and their access to basic rights
the situation of unaccompanied minors in border areas
the labour practices of migrant children
central website collating information on children and migration should be maintained.

For advocacy:

advocate for regional collaboration for ensuring the rights of children to access education and health. In particular regional coordination of responses to HIV are needed
conduct national level advocacy for the rights of all children regardless of documentation
advocate for police to focus on eradicating smugglers on borders

For policy development

advocate for the development of an action plan for unaccompanied minors
clarify the rights of different categories of migrants in the national plan of action on OVCs and the national framework for orphans and other children made vulnerable by HIV and AIDS

For organisational capacity building

support the development of in-house training for police and social workers on the rights of migrant children
support for organisations outside of urban centres is needed where migrant children are likely to be most vulnerable, in particular the borders with Lesotho and Mozambique
build local capacity for high level advocacy on child rights

For migrant communities

support the structures that offer information on migrant rights and create new training and information services in under-serviced areas
assist with the development of integration strategies in schools
facilitate the development of community based care and support structures for unaccompanied minors.

Authors: I. Palmary
Publisher: United Nations [UN] Children's Fund , 2009

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Fighting Poverty with Facts -Community-Based Monitoring Systems

carol — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 00:20:41 -0600

For more than two decades, governments and development agencies around the world have focused on reducing poverty. There have been advances, but progress has been uneven and nearly a quarter of the world's population still suffers from extreme "income poverty." Income poverty,however, is only part of the picture. A multi-faceted account of poverty and human welfare incorporates elements that go beyond income to capture the characteristics of poverty as experienced by the poor themselves.

This book presents the Community-Based Monitoring System (CBMS). CBMS recognizes that the poor must be involved in planning public programs that affect their well-being. It further recognizes that, to be effective, development programs must be targeted and informed by relevant, current, accurate disaggregated data. To accomplish this, CBMS brings together communities and local authorities to gather and monitor locally obtained, verifiable information about actual living conditions, and to use this information for planning and policy-making.

Drawing from CBMS experience in Africa and Asia, the authors present recommendations for policymakers, donor agencies, and researchers. They also present guidelines for developing and implementing poverty monitoring systems in other regions of the world. For more analysis, discussion, and case material, visit the companion website, www.idrc.ca/in_focus_poverty, which is included with the book, on CD.

THE AUTHORS

Celia Reyes is a Research Fellow at the Philippine Institute for Development Studies, Co-Director of the Poverty and Economic Policy research network, and CBMS Network Leader, based in Manila.

Evan Due is Senior Program Specialist responsible for economics and trade programs at IDRC's Singapore office.

IDRC 2009 - ISBN 978-1-55250-432-1 - e-ISBN 978-1-55250-435-2 - 124 pp.

Download or order the book from IDRC Website

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

The Codex Alimentarius Commission - who decides what food we eat?

KMAadmin — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 03:53:53 -0600

"The Codex Alimentarius Commission envisages a world afforded the highest attainable levels of consumer protection including food safety and quality. To this end, the Commission will develop internationally agreed standards and related texts for use in domestic regulation and international trade in food that are based on scientific principles and fulfil the objectives of consumer health protection and fair practices in food trade.

The Codex Alimentarius Commission is an intergovernmental body with over 170 members, within the framework of the Joint Food Standards Programme established by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO), with the purpose of protecting the health of consumers and ensuring fair practices in the food trade. The Commission also promotes coordination of all food standards work undertaken by international governmental and non governmental organizations.

The Codex Alimentarius (Latin, meaning Food Law or Code) is the result of the Commission’s work: a collection of internationally adopted food standards, guidelines, codes of practice and other recommendations."

STRATEGIC PLAN 2008–2013

This document sets out the Strategic Plan 2008–2013 for the Codex Alimentarius Commission, stating strategic goals of the Commission (Part1) and incorporating a list of programme areas and planned activities with a clearly defined timetable (Part 2). The strategic vision and goals for the Commission underpin the high priority attached to food safety by its parent organizations FAO and WHO.

Further information on these texts, or any other aspect of the Codex Alimentarius Commission, may be obtained from:

The Secretary
Codex Alimentarius Commission
Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Programme
Viale delle Terme di Caracalla
00153 Rome, Italy
Fax: +39 06 57054593
E-mail: codex@fao.org
http://www.codexalimentarius.net

Programme areas and planned activities2008–2013

Goal 1: Promoting sound regulatory frameworks
Goal 2: Promoting widest and consistent application of scientific principles and risk analysis
Goal 3: Strengthening Codex work-management capabilities
Goal 4: Promoting cooperation between Codex and other relevant international organizations
Goal 5: Promoting maximum and effective participation of members

full strategic plan available for download hereunder.

Fireside Chat

Preserving the Integrity of Folklore on Knowledge-based Service Platforms

storytelling — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 05:37:15 -0600

By: Mamello Thinyane, Alfredo Terzoli and Peter Clayton
Department of Computer Science, Rhodes University
P.O. Box 94, Grahamstown 6140, South Africa

Abstract:

Explorations of ICT as an enabler for community development are being undertaken by governments, non-governmental organizations and research institutions all across third-world nations. The pivotal role of ICT in development is acknowledged by all within the ICT4D domain and the effectiveness of well-situated interventions has been validated by the different ICT4D projects success stories. In our involvement with an ICT4D intervention (which spans the last three years) in Dwesa, South Africa, we developed and implemented eServices platforms with a focus on eCommerce, eGovernance and eHealth services. The undergirding layer in these platform has been the IK layer which allows for the integration of the local knowledge in manner that makes the deployed services relevant, allows the local communities to participate in the knowledge economy and activates, empowers, and positions the local communities within the global information and knowledge society.

In this paper we discuss our experiences from undertaking the project in Dwesa, and in particular we discuss the need for ethno-centricity and context sensitivity in the deployed IK based ICT solutions. This need for contextualization of ICT interventions is a result of the fact that the ICT solutions and technologies are developed within a specific worldview and context (in the case of knowledge based systems this in terms of the epistemological and ontological underpinnings of the knowledge, and the IKS dynamics that are specific to different communities) and therefore it is important that the technology is adapted to the specific community context. We discuss the OSCA knowledge matrix which highlights the nature of knowledge, that is typical in many of the third world communities, along the dimensions of ownership, social advantage, accessibility and confidentiality. For the different types of knowledge along the OSCA matrix, we discuss the different ICT mechanisms that ensure the integrity of the knowledge encapsulated in the developed IK service platform.

Introduction

ICT4D in general explores the ways in which ICT can be used in the context of community development. ICT is indeed providing the opportunities for dealing with rural poverty, inequality and exclusion and in many ways it is challenging the traditional paradigms of doing business, delivering services to citizens and running societal institutions [1]. But the key question at the center of all policy markers and governments is whether to invest in developing ICT capacities in the rural communities or rather to focus on the provision of other basic services (e.g. schools, hospitals, and government services). At the core of this question is really the need to understand the role that ICT can play in the development of a society and what the benefits and limitations can be expected from undertaking an ICT based approach to development.

Technology, in and of itself is not a panacea for the underdevelopment woes of communities, it is however a prerequisite for social development in this day and age [2]. Technology is neither a target towards community development and social well-being, but rather a tool for facilitating the achievement of desirable future for a society: well being, health, peace, and communality [3]. To a large extend, human activity depends on information and therefore a synergistic interaction of technology and information leads to a competitive advantage for societies [2]. ICT also increases information share-ability within communities and therefore can positively impact the provision of that information for commercial benefit, based on the differing valuation of the information to different people [4].

Knowledge Society Interventions

The current state of the art and the trends as far as knowledge networking technologies are concerned, presents numerous possibilities and benefits for human societies. The general context in which this research is undertaken is that of ICT4D. The specific research site for the project is a deep rural and marginalized community of Dwesa in South Africa. This community is characteristic of many third world rural realities in which ICT4D projects are undertaken. Situating the research in a specific area allows for an extensive and close study of the community and a situated determination of the direct needs and requirements of the community. The objective is still that the solutions developed and implemented in this specific context will be implementable in other similarly marginalized and rural communities.

The formal establishment of Dwesa as a research site for the ICT4D intervention came as a result of a link with previous research activities in the region by researchers from the Department of Anthropology at Rhodes University. The project undertaken in Dwesa, upon which this research is built, was initiated in 2005 with the preliminary discussions with the stakeholders in situ to assess its feasibility.

The initial objectives were to develop a prototype of an e-commerce platform for the arts and crafts entrepreneurs in the community, and also for the possible exploration of micro-tourism potential in the area. The introduction of the eCommerce aspect to the economic activities in Dwesa was aimed at activating the community towards greater involvement in economic activities in the region, but also at opening up the market base to incorporate wider international customers. The eCommerce portal was developed in direct interaction with the local arts and crafts entrepreneurs to integrate their specific needs and requirements into the platform.

The initial deployment of the services in Dwesa was centralized and predominantly web-based. Some of the above mentioned service portals are accessed primarily through a web interface to a server deployed in one of the schools. The successful deployment of the initial phase of the project paved the way to an alternative conceptualization and revision of the intervention in Dwesa. The initial phase of the project was centered around the eCommerce platform and the establishment of the associated infrastructure to support the effective utilization of the portal. The subsequent realization of the platform is to develop it as a multi-functional, multi-service, distributed communication platform for the local community. This integrates into the platform the flexibility to deploy a plethora of community based services in a manner that is distributed across the different points of access in the community. One of the key features of this new architecture and platform is that it is an inherently multi-service platform. The provision of eCommerce, eGovernment, eHealth and eJudiciary services would be built in an integrated manner on the platform as opposed to as independent service portals.

Ethno-centricity and context-sensitivity

One of the primary tenets of the discipline of ethnocomputing is the realization of the culture specific influences on computing and subsequently on the Internet [5]. Tedre et al also identify three levels of uniqueness in the human enterprise, depicted in Figure 1 [6].

At the lowest of the levels is the general human nature that is common to all human beings, the influences that emanate from this level are universal and are appreciated globally. The next level is the cultural level of uniqueness, which is encapsulates values, ideas, preferences that have been learned over time and that are part of an identity of a specific group or category of people. The topmost level, and the smallest, is the personality level. At this level, the variation is as large as there are people of earth, and it is the level at which the individuality of human being is expressed in terms of values, beliefs, and preferences.

In the consideration of ICT in development, the focus is at the level of a culture, the middle level in Figure 1. The aspects of computing that are universal and that are aligned with the general human nature, are easily transplanted from one community to another. Aspects that are cultural however, need to be considered, adapted and validated for adequacy within the environment where they are being implemented [7]. ICT4D should therefore take into consideration the ethnographic considerations and expressions of a community to avoid the technology determinism flaw that has plagued many ICT4D projects [8].

The realization of an ethnographic ICT for development intervention necessarily has to address the issues at the interface between technology and the culture of a community. More appropriately, it has to address the encoded cultural expressions in the technology and their interaction with the culture of the community in which the intervention is being undertaken. This intervention strategy is positioned within the premise that for rural communities to be active participants and peers in the global eSociety, the technology has to be relevant and contextualized to their environment.

OSCA Knowledge Matrix

Knowledge systems dynamics differ from one community to another based on numerous factors. Some of the factors that characterize different communities and that directly influence the usage and exchange of knowledge include: the levels of social stratification and the relationship between the different strata, the general power relation dynamics, and the extend of communal orientation within the community. These factors have a direct bearing on the realization of knowledge systems in communities and form part of the critical points of departure in the implementations of knowledge systems for different communities. For example, a knowledge system developed for a fairly egalitarian community where there is a cultural sense of openness and sharing would implement far less features around confidentiality and privacy than for a society with opposite cultural orientation.

This section therefore highlights the different factors and the associated dynamics that are specific to the Dwesa community, that have direct bearing of the realization of a knowledge platform for that community. These factors are characteristic of other similarly rural, marginalized, African communities.

In Nonaka's SECI framework of knowledge, he makes a distinction between two types of knowledge: tacit knowledge and explicit knowledge. Within the SECI framework, a process of externalization provides access to the internal tacit knowledge through explicit expression by the individual. In understanding the specific knowledge dynamics in Dwesa, the focus is on explicit knowledge as this is the knowledge that is accessible and codifiable.

The categorization of knowledge in this sections is based on a superficial aggregation of similar types of knowledge that exhibit similar characteristics, and not on any ontological or epistemological considerations. The differences in the categories of knowledge highlight specific requirements for the knowledge platform. The different categories of knowledge have been elucidated through discussions with the Dwesa community members, individuals from the Xhosa culture and other South African cultures. We present these different types of knowledge in a graph we have developed, called the OSCA knowledge matrix, which is based on the mapping of different knowledge types along the dimensions of Ownership, Social advantage, Confidentiality and Accessibility (Fig. 2):

Common knowledge - This is the knowledge that is common to every human being and not particular to any locality or a group of people. This knowledge once codified, is accessible in the public domain and every individual is entitled to access, use and benefit from it.
Shared-cultural knowledge - This is the knowledge that is specific to a cultural group. This knowledge is identifiable with the culture and can be assumed to be owned by that cultural group. Examples of this knowledge include folktales, stories, proverbs and riddles. This knowledge also includes arts and crafts patterns and artifacts. The issue of ownership of this kind of knowledge is a contentious one and at the core of it is the concern for the commercial exploitation that sometimes occurs. While this knowledge can be assumed to be owned by a specific ethnic and cultural group, it is however accessible to the public.
Specific group knowledge - Within the Xhosa culture (i.e. the culture of the people in Dwesa), and in fact within other South African cultures, there is knowledge that is associated with different groups. These groups form around age, gender, social status, or ethnicity. The kind of knowledge in this category is not only owned by the specific group, but it is also private and confidential (at varying levels) to that group. Examples of this kind of knowledge include, the secret knowledge of the amadoda (the men, vs the boys) in the Xhosa culture, or banna in the Sesotho culture. Access to this kind of knowledge is normally associated with an initiation process into the group, which in this particular case is through the initiation schools. This kind of knowledge is exchanged and communicated within the confines of the group. This knowledge is associated with key social and power dynamics and in a sense access to this knowledge (or membership to the group through the initiation process) gives an individual certain social advantages. An example from the Xhosa culture is that the males who have not been to the bush (the initiation school) have lesser roles to play in family ceremonies, are held at a lesser regard as amankwenkwe (the boys) within the community.
Specialist knowledge - An example of this type of knowledge is the medical knowledge of the amagqirha (the traditional healers) in the Xhosa culture. This knowledge is very confidential and secretive at best. It is owned by a specific individual or a close knit group of individuals. This knowledge gives the owners an advantage within their community or society. This social advantage can be in a form of the prestige that the person gets in the community, or the direct competitive advantage from the point of view of the commercial benefits of being the healer in the community. Access to this kind of knowledge is very strict and only a few people (e.g. a protege, an heir) have access to this knowledge.

Knowledge platform and related projects.

The OSCA knowledge matrix has informed the development of a knowledge platform, called KnowNet, for the Dwesa community. The KnowNet platform underlies the eServices portals that are developed for the community. For example, the eHealth portal is developed to interface and to integrate with the local medical IK. The encapsulation of knowledge is preformed at two levels. At one level, the coding of the logic and the implementation of procedural functions represents the internal knowledge about the functioning of the platform. At the core of the platform, is another level at which knowledge is explicitly encapsulated in ontologies and folksonomies. This happens at the knowledge base layer. Ontologies provide the formal and explicit specification of conceptualization of knowledge. Ontologies are domain-specific and narrowly defined for the particular area of knowledge. On the other hand, folksonomies allow for a freely structured, widely distributed, bottom-up, categorization of knowledge entities. Folksonomies represent and reveal the wide spread conceptualization and the emergent structure of knowledge.

A number of ontologies have been developed, specifically contextualized to Dwesa. These ontologies represent the following key areas of targeted eServices deployment as part of the larger project undertaken with this community:

Health/Medicine – the knowledge encapsulated in this ontology is the traditional medical knowledge that is part of the every day life in Dwesa. This knowledge becomes crucial in the implementation of eHealth portals.
Agriculture – the community in Dwesa is predominantly subsistence farmers, and this is a central area of community life. The IK around agriculture is contained in this ontology, which allows for the development of services that support farming in the region.
Commerce – the potential for commercial activities in Dwesa is very high. This could be in terms of micro-tourism, arts and crafts entrepreneurship, and eco-tourism as a result of the availability of a nature reserve in the area. This ontology encapsulates the knowledge around these specific areas to enable to eCommerce customer to have an improved experience in the utilization of the portals.
Cultural knowledge - the cultural knowledge is an important aspect of any community, and the usage of this type of knowledge permeates a variety of community services. This ontology therefore encapsulates the history, the folklore and the practices of the specific community.

Related ICT machanisms

Folksonomies and ontologies represent two positions on the spectrum of KR. On one end is the structuring of knowledge in organic, bottom up folksonomies in which the structure of the underlying knowledge emerges as the users associate content with different semantic tags. On the other end is the formalized, top-down, structured ontologies in which the knowledge gets populated into the ontologies that have been design by the experts. These two approaches to knowledge management both have their advantages and disadvantages, which are applicable in the context of the knowledge platform.

The implementation of support for folksonomies within the platform is implemented in a manner that allows the users of the platform to define tags that are associated with the different IK that is added and available on the platform. The weighting of these tags results in an emergent classification of the knowledge in a manner that represents the users' understanding of the structure of the knowledge. This emergent structure as a result of tagging the knowledge items, can be utilized to inform the revision of the associated platform ontologies . The tags associated with content can also add a weighting on the index searches that are performed on the platform. The utilization of folksonomies within the platform therefore allows for KR that is contextualized, due to being informed by the users' ontological views.

Confidentiality

One of the culture sensitive aspects that have been taken into account in the development of KnowNet is the confidentiality considerations associated with the different types of knowledge in Dwesa (and generally in rural marginalized communities). We discussed the OSCA knowledge matrix, which highlights the different types of knowledge and the associated levels of confidentiality in the community. The knowledge platform provides permissions control mechanisms to enable the specifying of the different confidentiality requirements. These requirements are handled as follows:

For the specialist knowledge (type D in Fig. 2), there is highest requirement for confidentiality and this kind of knowledge is only shared between a few specific individuals. This is achieved in KnowNet through an option to allow the owner of the knowledge to share it with a specific person already on their list of friends (i.e. related by a dwesa:knows or sub-class thereof) and to limit access from the rest of the users of the platform (Fig. 3 (a) and (b)).

The specific group knowledge (type C in Fig. 1 is shared between a small group of individuals and the group membership is typically based on a relational association between the members. Within the platform, this is enabled through permissions that are associated with a relationship type (Fig. 3 (c)). For example, one can set the read flag only for the people within the same family (i.e. associated by the dwesa:isFamily predicate) or people within the same clan group.

A key consideration for the shared cultural knowledge is the establishment of the ownership of the knowledge. On the KnowNet platform this is achieved through the association of every unit of knowledge authored with a specific user, or a specific cultural group. The actual mechanisms of enforcing the protection of the knowledge (from exploitation and abuse) are within the legislative domain in terms of copyright laws and policies.

The common knowledge is accessible and available to every user of the platform and therefore such knowledge can be authored with the read and write permissions set On for the group everyone (Fig. 3).

KnowNet implements access and permission control mechanisms that offer flexibility to cater for the different relational groupings within the community of users. The implementation of these mechanisms is possible due to the functional separation of content (i.e. knowledge base tier) from the domain logic (i.e. interaction tier) and the integration of the relational dynamics (through the social networking tier) as articulated through the PIASK architecture [9]. The platform is therefore validated as adequate for the purpose of encapsulating different types of knowledge, from the point of view of implementing the necessary confidentiality and ownership requirements as per the OSCA knowledge matrix.

IK lifecycle

The realization of the platform has been with a direct focus on being situated within the context of rural, marginalized areas as typified by Dwesa. Some of the key differences with such contexts are associated with the social dynamics, the socio-technological constraints, and the infrastructural limitations. The notion of IK is predominantly (within literature) applied to these kind of rural contexts, although in reality every community and society has knowledge that is indigenous within that community. The processes associated with IK are therefore universal and apply equally in different contexts. The life cycle discussed by Woytek in [10], encapsulates the key processes that are associated with IK. Although the life cycle is discussed from the understanding of IK being a special, different type of knowledge (i.e. not universally available) and from an external perspective (i.e. from the perspective of someone studying the IK of a specific community), it still highlights the crucial factors in the utilization of IK.

These processes are handled within the knowledge platform as follows:

Recognition and identification - the first stage in the knowledge life cycle is the recognition and the identification of the knowledge sources that are available in a community. This process in a sense occurs within the externalization process in Nonaka's SECI framework (Section [par:Knowledge-in-society]). Externalization results in the knowledge being available in a codified form. This process is therefore facilitated in KnowNet by the ability to add new content on the platform in an explicit format (e.g. a recording of a folktale, or authoring a story).
Validation - Once the knowledge is available in an explicit form, the next process involves validating that knowledge along the dimensions of significance, relevance, and reliability. This process is intrinsically a community process, in that the significance, relevance and reliability can only be ascertained in the context of people accessing the knowledge and commenting on it. KnowNet provides a feature for the users of the platform to validate the different content that is available on the platform. The users are able to give a vote on the content, in terms of its reliability, relevance and accuracy. The accumulated voting for the content is then calculated and made available to inform the usage of the content. The validation weights from the users are also useful in ranking the search results on the platform. The net effect from this validation mechanism is that the content that is most reliable, relevant and accurate will hopefully get the highest weighting on the platform and increased availability, and the content that the users do not find reliable, relevant and accurate gets the low weightings.
Documentation - The process of documenting the IK primarily contributes to the externalization of the knowledge and therefore this is handled through the mechanism to add new knowledge on the platform.
Storage - The knowledge base layer is primarily responsible for the storage of the knowledge that is available on the platform.
Transfer and Dissemination - Intrinsic in the platform is the facilitation of the exchange of knowledge between different people and making the knowledge available. KnowNet provides features for the knowledge to be accessed via any of the channels (implemented via the Access layer agents) that are available on the platform, thus increasing the accessibility of the knowledge. For example, a user can call into the platform, browse the specific content and request that the associated file be emailed to them.

The support for the different processes in the IK lifecycle aligns the platform for effective integration into the communities as far as representing and encapsulating the local knowledge (i.e. IK) within that community.

Conclusion

The proliferation of ICT4D interventions is necessitating the exploration of mechanisms to position the undertaken projects within the context and environment of deployment. We have discussed an ICT4D project that we are undertaking in Dwesa, South Africa. Within that, we have highlighted the importance of integrating IK within the developed eServices platform. In order to formalize the dynamics associated with different types of IK, we have developed the OSCA knowledge matrix. We then highlighted the available ICT solutions towards meeting the requirements for the 4 different types of knowledge that have been identified in marginalized rural communities.

References

[1] - Bhatnagar, S., Information Technology and Development Foundation and Key Issues, Information and Communication Technology in Rural development: Case Studies from India. World Bank Institute, pp. 1--12, 2000

[2] - Castells, M., Information technology, globalization and social development, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, 1999

[3] - Hietanen, O., The Global Challenges of eDevelopment - From Digital Divides Towards Empowerment and Sustainable Global Information Society, in Seminar of global perspectives of development communication, University of Tampere, 2004

[4] - Singh, B., Information Technology for Rural Development in India, State University of New York at Buffalo, 2002

[5] - Tedre, M. and Sutinen, E. and Kahkonen, E. and Kommers, P., Ethnocomputing: ICT in cultural and social context, Communications of the ACM, vol. 49, no. 1, pp. 126--130, 2006

[6] - Tedre, M. and Sutinen, E. and Kahkonen, E. and Kommers, P., Appreciating the knowledge of students in computer science education in developing countries, Proceedings of International Conference on Information Technology Research and Education (ITRE2003), pp. 174--178, 2003

[7] - Thinyane, M. and Dalvit, L. and Terzoli, A. and Clayton, P., The Internet in rural communities: unrestricted and contextualized, in Proceedings of ICT Africa conference, 2008

[8] - Thinyane, M. and Terzoli, A. and Clayton, P., Transitions Towards a Knowledge Society: Aspectual pre-evaluation of a Culture-Sensitive Implementation Framework, in Learning to live in the knowledge society, Springer IFIP - Learning of live in the knowledge society, vol. 281, pp. 271-278, 2008

[9] - Thinyane, M. and Dalvit, L. and Terzoli, A. and Clayton, P., Towards a Model of an Ontology Based, Multi-Modal and Multimedia Knowledge Portal for Marginalized Rural Communities., in Proceedings of IEEE Information Communication Technologies International Symposium, Fez - Morocco, 3rd - 5th April, 2007

[10] - Woytek, R. and Gorjestani, N. and Africa Regional Office, Indigenous Knowledge for Development: A Framework for Action, World Bank, 1998

KM & Social Challenges

Africa's Development in a Changing Climate

carol — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 00:18:19 -0600

Key policy advice from World Development Report 2010 and Making Development Climate Resilient: A World Bank Strategy for
Sub-Saharan Africa - Act Now, Act Together, Act Differently

"Over the past ten years, Sub-Saharan Africa has made a great deal of progress in terms of economic growth. In fact, Africa has the potential to emerge as an exciting new center of growth in the evolving global economy. However, to continue on an accelerated growth path, the region needs to tackle climate variability and climate change, which now pose a daunting risk to growth, development, and poverty reduction. Climate is hardly a new factor in the region's history, but with global warming, Africa's vulnerability is deepening, making it the most exposed region in the world to the impacts of climate change. The hard-won progress of recent years could be reversed with extreme weather, crop failures, and outbreaks of hunger and disease."

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & the Environment

Running a junior farmer field and life school - Empowering orphans and vulnerable children

carol — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 03:34:20 -0600

Getting started! : running a junior farmer field and life school, Empowering orphans and vulnerable children living in a world with HIV and AIDS

WIEGERS, Esther HILL, Catherine COLBERT,Patricia 2007

Country focus: Kenya, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe

In response to the growing number of children orphaned by AIDS, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the World Food Programme and other partners have implemented Junior Farmer Field and Life Schools in some African countries. These are designed to empower orphans and other vulnerable children aged 12 to 18 years who live in communities where HIV/AIDS has had a strong impact on food security.A JFFLS seeks to improve the livelihoods of vulnerable boys and girls and provide them with opportunities for the future, while minimizing the risk of adopting negative coping behaviours. To increase these children's self esteem and livelihood prospects, a JFFLS imparts agricultural knowledge and life skills to orphaned and other vulnerable girls and boys. The knowledge and skills not only empower the children economically, but also help them to become responsible citizens with positive values regarding gender and human rights. The JFFLS contribute to the MDGs of combating HIV/AIDS and improving the lives of children, particularly in rural areas.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Climate change, population pressure and conflict in South Africa

carol — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 05:27:23 -0600

Climate change presents humanity with its largest challenge in recorded history. Its predicted eff ects over the coming decades include extreme weather events, droughts, fl ooding, rising sea levels that could affect countries such as Nigeria and Mozambique, retreating glaciers (although not in Africa, but with global impact), changes in habitats and increased spread of life-threatening diseases such as malaria.

Little concrete analysis has been published on the relationship between climate change and conflict, however, and even less on the potential role that population growth plays in intensifying that pressure.

Today Africa is home to the most rapid levels of population growth and of urbanisation in the world and will shortly have more people than China. Already it is inhabited by 14 per cent of the world’s human population – a proportion that will rise to 25 per cent by 2050. Africa will inevitably face greater challenges owing to climate change than any other region."

Climate change, population pressure and conflict in South Africa

Author: Cilliers, Jakkie
Institute for Security Studies (South Africa)
Pretoria: ISS 2009

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Weathering the Storm: Options for Framing Adaptation and Development Share

carol — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 02:53:40 -0600

Attempts to clarify the relationship between adaptation and development by analyzing 135 projects, policies, and other initiatives from the developing world that have been labeled by implementers or researchers as "adaptation to climate change." Confusion about the relationship between adaptation and development has meant that funding mechanisms may create redundancies or leave gaps in the landscape of critical adaptation and development activities.

Drawing on Internet resources, Weathering the Storm attempts to clarify this relationship by analyzing 135 projects, policies, and other initiatives from the developing world that have been labeled by implementers or researchers as "adaptation to climate change."

The report analyzes the objectives of initiatives and the strategies utilized in implementation to characterize some of the ways that adaptation and development overlap. A continuum of activities from "pure" development to "pure" climate change is proposed as a conceptual framework to understand when different "development" activities may play an "adaptation" function. Recommendations address governance challenges, funding implications, and next steps in analysis and policy development.

Author: Heather McGray, Anne Hammill, Rob Bradley, with E. Lisa Schipper and Jo-Ellen Parry
November, 2007 ISBN: 978-1-56973-672-2

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Family Planning Around Environmentally Sensitive Regions in Madagascar

carol — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 01:02:47 -0600

In January 2005, USAID/Madagascar requested the Health Communication Partnership (HCP) to assist the Government of Madagascar, specifically its National AIDS Control Committee (SE/CNLS), to develop a behavior change communication strategy targeting HIV prevention among youth and young adults. The Ankoay, or Eagle, approach was launched in April 2005 through the National Scouting Federation which unites six scouting organizations. The Ankoay program was assessed by the SE/CNLS after one year of implementation and was judged a national “best practice” in HIV prevention among youth.

In August 2007, through additional funding from USAID/Madagascar, AED launched Ankoay Doré, a second level of activities designed for youth groups that had successfully completed the Ankoay program. The initial Ankoay Doré approach added hygiene activities to HIV prevention. In early 2008, through C-Change, the Ankoay Doré model was expanded to include adolescent reproductive health and environmental activities. This report describes the accomplishments achieved by the C-Change activity through February 2009.

C-Change Madagascar Ankoay Dore Final Report - March 2009.pdf 418.78 KB
http://www.c-changeprogram.org/resources/fp-environmentally-sensitive-re...

KM & Communications

Social and Behaviour Change Communication Capacity Assessment Tool

carol — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 00:49:10 -0600

The Social and Behavior Change Communication (SBCC) Capacity Assessment Tool was developed for use in workshop and meeting venues in which an organization and a facilitiator work to determine an organization's competencies to carry out
SBCC programming in three areas:

Planning and design,
Program implementation, and
Monitoring and evaluation (M&E) and research

A facilitator administers the tool to members of an organization and provides the scoring along with feedback, which serves as a baseline and identifies the gaps in the organization that require strengthening. The same tool can be administered at a later point to provide data that shows improvements in specific competencies and where additional work still remains.

This flexible tool can be adapted for use across a wide variety of health areas, including HIV and AIDS, malaria, family planning and maternal, and sexual and reproductive health. Users are encouraged to adapt sections of the tool or use the particular components that best address their needs in assessing capacities of organizations implementing SBCC programs. Comments are welcome; send an email to cchange@aed.org with subject line: SBCC Capacity Assessment Tool

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Urban Agriculture: A Response to Food Insecurity?

KMAadmin — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 02:32:00 -0600

Author: Nyumbaiza Tambwe

Abstract

The United Nations Population Fund-State of World 2007 considers 2008 as the year of new departure in human history in that half of the globe’s population (3.3 billion) will be living in the towns and cities. The report outlines the fact that most of these urbanites will be in developing countries and they will be poor. In Africa and Asia particularly, urban population is expected to double between 2000 and 2030. While Asia’s urban population is projected to increase from 1.36 billion to 2.64 billion, Africa’s urban population is expected to increase from 294 million to 742 million.

As a consequence, satisfying urban dwellers’ basic needs in terms of health, food, education, housing, water and other needs could be challenging. Even though cities and towns benefit from most of the local and foreign investments, urban areas experience high rates of unemployment, food insecurity and poverty, which continue to exacerbate.

To alleviate some of these problems, a large number of urban residents in developing countries, particularly in Africa, resort to urban agriculture for food, income generation, and employment. City dwellers convert open spaces (backyards, parks, garbage deposits, power lines and railways, roads, and peri-urban zones) into gardens and farms as a means of reducing urban poverty.

Taking Lubumbashi city (the second largest city of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) as case study, this paper seeks to explore the potentiality of urban agriculture as source of income and food. The paper uses a sustainable livelihoods approach based on alternative theories of development. The livelihood perspective argues that individuals and households diversify assets, incomes, and activities in response to the pressure of push and pull factors. In the context of economic crisis, urban agriculture may become a response to food insecurity if economically viable, and adaptative to urban dynamics and capable of recovering from shocks and trends.

Specifically, the paper analyzes three categories of farming households and comes to the conclusion that agriculture within and around Lubumbashi city is more of a survival strategy than an entrepreneurial one for the majority of farming households. Only less than a quarter of selected farmers have been able to move out of food insecurity and poverty. The majority of farmers are food secure just for a short period of time (that is at the harvest time, three to four months). The paper shows that farmers who practice urban agriculture as their primary activity may become food secure if supported by the state and development agencies. Poverty that characterizes the majority of farmers, competition for land, and rapid population growth constitute a real threat to the expansion of agricultural activities within and around the city.

Data has been collected by means of semi-structured interviews, in-depth questions, observation and informal conversation, as well as primary and secondary sources. One hundred farming households have been selected and interviewed between November 2004 and March 2005. The analysis of the collected data required the use of SPSS for quantitative data and the interpretation for those of qualitative nature.

Introduction

The paper attempts to establish a relationship between urban agriculture and food security. In other words, it seeks to examine the impact of agricultural activities taking place within and around the city of Lubumbashi on household level. The paper uses the sustainable livelihood approach based on the theories of alternative development. Instead of identifying all strategies used in urban areas, the study focuses on urban agriculture because of its potential as source of food and income. On methodological level, using the non-probability sampling, the city was divided into its seven administrative wards. As each ward is administratively divided into areas, each area was taken as reference for the selection of informants. A quota sampling of two farmers was given to each area regardless the fact that the number of urban farmers or gardeners was unknown. By selecting at least two farmers in each area of each ward, this means that all Lubumbashi wards were representative in the sample. Also most of the socio-economic categories of people living in this city were represented. Gender as well as a third criterion of selection completed the two-mentioned criteria. More than a half farmers selected was women. With 41 administrative areas, a total of 100 farming households were selected.

The body of this paper is structured as into five main sections. The first section explains why the city of Lubumbashi has been chosen as a study site. Secondly, a brief review of the anthropological literature on household strategies is presented with a focus on the household economy. Alternative development literature considers the household as the starting point in the process of production and consumption. The third section as a practical section examines two major components of food security to see whether urban agriculture permits food to be available and accessible to farming households living in the city of Lubumbashi. The section deals with three farming households representing the major categories of farmers. Fourthly, the paper identifies various types of strategies used by individuals and households to address the question of food insecurity in the city of Lubumbashi. Finally the fifth section emphasizes the role played by women in the household as caregivers and managers. Here, particular attention is drawn on the reinforcement of women’s role in the household and the burden it implies.

Lubumbashi city: study site

The choice of Lubumbashi as a study area is due to its weight in the economy of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Commonly called the capital of copper, Lubumbashi lived for almost one century at the rhythm of the giant mining company, Gécamines. The majority of companies in Katanga province functioned on the orbit of Gécamines. This was the case for example of the railway company (Société Nationale de Chemin de Fer du Congo) which was created to transport Gécamines minerals, from Katanga to Angola and from Katanga to Tanzania.

Considering the dominant economic weight of Gécamines, its collapse in the 1990s deepened the economic crisis in the country. It must be added that Gécamines fall affected primarily its labour force: more than 11 000 workers were retrenched. Secondly, this resulted in the fall of all companies operated on its orbit.

The post-Gécamines era is characterized by a high rate of unemployment in Lubumbashi, low income for people working in government and parastatal services and the rise of informal economic activities. The rapid population growth and poverty in the city worsen the living conditions of urbanites. Therefore, there is a necessity to find out how people cope with the economic crisis in the context of a state that is unable to play its traditional role (public services, protection of citizens, and so on). Instead of identifying all the strategies used by the poor as recommend the sustainable livelihood approach, the attention in this paper focuses on the one that emerges “urban agriculture”.

The household: economy and polity

By considering the emergent urban agriculture, this paper opts for the theories of alternative development, which constitutes a move away from large-scale model of development theories. The reason is that the Congolese state as well as its market economy is too fragile, too weak to be taken as major factors from which development may be originated. Large-scale theories consider the state and the market economy as the key players in development. In his analysis of state in the developing countries, Evans (1989:562) classifies Zaire (former name of the Democratic Republic of Congo) in the category of predatory states. The major characteristic of predatory state is that state administration lacks coherence and efficiency. This constitutes a handicap to the promotion of economic and social development. Predatory state is politically dominated and economically exploited by small political power elite. National resources are abusively used by the clic (team of major political players) in power for their own interests. To quote Evans (1989: 569-70):

“The Zairian state apparatus have extracted vast personal fortunes from the revenues generated by exporting the country’s impressive mineral wealth. During the first two decades of Mobutu’s rule, Zaire’s gross national product per capita has declined at an annual rate of 2.1% (World Bank, 1988), gradually moving the country toward the very bottom of the world hierarchy of nations and leaving its population in misery as bad as or worse than they suffered under the Belgian colonial regime”.
The launch of a multiparty system in mid-nineties did not improve the situation. This coincided with the collapse of the giant mining firm (Gécamines), the collapse of state services, mal-governance and corruption. While the average income reached its highest level in the 1973 at US $ 1.31 percent per day, by 1998, that figure was down to US $ 0.30, an average drop of over three percent per year (UNDP, 2006:7).

The majority of urban poor find refuge in the household. Contrary to the neoclassical economy, which considers the household only as a unit of consumption; the household in the alternative development literature is regarded at the same time as a unit of production and a unit of consumption. As unit of production, the household is involved in market and non-market income-producing activities. Based on Polanyi (1977), Friedmann (1992), and Martinussen (1997), the most important socio-economic institution of the civil society is the household.

Additionally, the household is also a polity. As a polity, the household is a unit that makes decisions on a daily basis concerning the use of household resources and other matters that affect their lives and livelihoods. As acknowledged by Freidmann (1992:46), conflicts may arise within the household over questions of power-who does what kind of work, who controls what portion of whose income, whose voice should count in the last instance in decisions.

The Friedmann’s model of household economy distinguishes three major sources of monetary income in the household: (i) formal work, (ii) informal work, and net family transfers. Similarly with regard to the sources of income, the author distinguishes three kinds of expenditures, namely (i) consumption proper (food, clothing), (ii) investment in household durables (including housing, furnishing), and (iii) investment in the capacities and skills. Finally, Freidmann’s model envisages that the state provides social services such as health care, land donations, subsidized bus transportation, school lunch programs, and police protection.

Components of food security

According to Rukuni and Eicher (1988), the concepts of food policy and food security came of age in the early 1980s. It was firstly defined as “the ability of food deficit countries to meet target consumption levels on a year-to-year basis” (Alberto 1981 cited in Rukuni and Eicher 1988:133). In 1986, the World Bank and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) formulated the most accepted definition of food security. According to this definition, there is food security when all people, at all times, have access to sufficient and safe food preferences for an active and healthy life. Various levels of food security have been distinguished: national, regional, and local. For example, a food secure household is a household in which all members have access at all times to enough food for an active and healthy life.

Two major components of food security appear in the above definition: food availability and food affordability. Availability of food means that sufficient safe and nutritious food is either domestically produced or imported from the international market. Food may be available on the market, but it must be accessible to the population. For food to be accessible, individuals and households must be able to afford the food prices on the market.

The opposite of food security is food insecurity. Food insecurity is described as a condition in which people and households lack basic food intake to provide them with the energy and nutrients for fully productive lives. Food insecurity becomes chronic from the moment it translates into a high degree of vulnerability to undernourishment and this is related to poverty, existing mainly in poor countries.

Domestic Food Production

In 2002-2003, Lubumbashi residents produced only 13,214 tons of maize, which represented just 4.8 per cent of their real needs (see table1.1). In fact, Lubumbashi city at that time needed 274,340 tons of maize to feed 1.2 million inhabitants. Although the provincial maize production estimated 369,078 tons (see Annual Report of the Provincial Agricultural Service, 2002-2003) may cover the demand in maize in the city, it must be pointed out that Lubumbashi population constitutes only one-quarter of Katanga province’s population (5 million inhabitants). Theoretically, Lubumbashi dwellers alone consume 74.3 per cent of the total maize produced in the province. Actually, the maize production is shared by Lubumbashi population and the rest of Katanga population. More than that, the neighbouring provinces are also served from the same production. That is the reason why Lubumbashi city imports maize from Zambia, South Africa and Tanzania to compensate the emptiness left.

According to the United Nations Development Program (2006:3), 80 per cent of Congolese live under conditions of extreme poverty (less than US$ 1 a day), 71 per cent suffer from food insecurity, 57 per cent have no access to safe drinking water, and 54 per cent of Congolese cannot benefit from basic health services. From the above data, it can be deduced that food insecurity in the city of Lubumbashi results more from people’s lack of access to food than from lack of available food. With a salary of US$ 10 earned in the public sector (by a nurse in public hospital, a teacher at the primary school or a police officer), whatever the quantity of food produced and its availability on the market, this category of population cannot afford it. At the period the interviews were carried out, a bag of maize (50kg) cost at least US$ 40. Low purchasing power or lack of money to buy the available expensive food makes the majority of Lubumbashi residents unable to obtain sufficient, nutritious, personally acceptable food through normal food channels. This confirms the argument developed by a number of researchers such as Reutlinger and Selowsky (1976), Sen (1991) and Rukuni and Eicher (1988) that poverty is the major cause of famine and hunger in the world. While Reutlinger and Selowsky challenged the assumption that higher rates of economic growth, food production, and market forces bring about an improvement in nutrition in the Third World within an acceptable time frame, Sen challenged the prevailing view that famine was caused primarily by a food production shortfall. As a result, people resorted to food production as one of the strategies to supplement their low income and to generate income. While for the majority of Lubumbashi farmers, urban agriculture is just a secondary activity, for others it is a primary activity and for a very small category of farmers, urban agriculture is a source of enrichment.

Urban agriculture as a secondary source of food: the Ngoy household

Ngoy household represents the majority of farming households interviewed (77%) for which urban agriculture is a secondary activity. Therefore, food production is a supplement to the low income earned by the household. The urban poor practice several activities for their survival. And urban agriculture is one among many others.

Married and a father of six children, Ngoy is a 49-year-old man, and is working at a Chinese’s store. His wife (Kakazi Ngoy) sells vegetables on the market which are grown on the backyard garden. With US$ 15 earned per month, Ngoy complained to be unable to feed his family:

Low household income is one of the reasons invocated by urban poor to explain their engagement in food production. To supplement the low salary earned and to reduce the severity of economic crisis, Ngoy encouraged his wife in 1993 to use the vacant land surrounding their yard in order to grow vegetables.

Our yard does not have enough space to grow vegetables. But around the yard, there is vacant land to be used for agricultural activities. So, I asked my wife to use it for the growing of some vegetables. Our neighbours have been doing so for a long time. She accepted because it was the only way to survive.

As it appears, low income households exploit any vacant land in the city in order to produce food. Since vegetables are grown around the yard, Ngoy household does not buy vegetables anymore. By contrast, instead of buying bitoyo (local salted fishes) and ndakala (small fried fish) as main condiment in the household, Ngoy household has adopted vegetables as the main accompaniment. By replacing fish with vegetables, the Ngoy household standard of life is declining. Vegetables are generally consumed to accompany fish and not as a substitute.

By alternating the growing of vegetables all over the year, farming households aim to secure their members from bad harvest due to a climate change or bad harvest of one crop. Alternating crops is like diversifying crops on one garden or farm. The advantage diversification of crops is to reduce the risk of shortage as a downturn in one activity is offset to some extent by the continued production of others.” Explaining the reason why his wife alternates the growing of vegetables on the same garden, Ngoy stated:
My wife grows amaranth, sweet potato leaves and marrow leaves in rain season primarily for home consumption, but those (cabbages) grown on dry season are primarily sold even though the family consumes part of the produce.

Ngoy household as well as many other households in this category are self-sufficient in vegetables. They have different kinds of vegetables they cultivate. When there is a surplus of production, the surplus is sold.

My wife sells vegetables on the market. Sometimes people come to our house to buy vegetables. When she sells well, the family can afford two maize meals a day. Generally, we eat once a day.

The growing of vegetables or their selling does not solve the problem of malnutrition. Instead of sleeping on an empty stomach, urban farming allows poor household members to get one or two more meals a day. Despite the contribution of vegetables in the household’s diet, Ngoy acknowledged that his household’s living conditions have not yet improved.
In summary, households falling into Ngoy household’s category undertake agricultural activities to supplement their low income by using various strategies namely reduction of expenditures on food, reduction of the quantity and quality of meals, suppression of some kinds of meals (meat, potatoes, rice, etc) and increasing the number of meals during the harvest period. Unfortunately, the majority of these strategies are survivalist.

Urban agriculture as a primary source of food: the Kilambe household

Kilambe household represents the 3 per cent of households selected, which were able through urban agriculture to feed their members for the entire year, and also the 6 per cent who did so for only six months. It must be added that the majority of the households interviewed were food secure only during the harvest period (3 to 4 months). Households falling into this household category are those who practice urban agriculture as the primary activity for food production and income generation.
Kashika Kilambe has been living in the city of Lubumbashi since 1970. She is a 55 year-old-woman. She is a married woman and has got seven children of whom two are already married. But two of her husband’s nephews and her own sisters live with them. Her husband worked at TabaCongo, but has been retrenched in 1999. Since then, she has become the main food producer and supplier of the family. Like many other households, Kilambe explained the reason of her engagement in food production:

I decided to grow vegetables on the back of our yard in 1993. There was food shortage in the city, particularly maize flour. The scarcity of maize flour was coupled with the scarcity of money because of the monetary reform, which occurred that year. It became tough to feed our big family. I undertook to grow vegetables on the backyard to get fresh vegetables (sweet potato leaves and amaranth, marrow leaves and, I even sold part of my vegetables.

The growing of vegetables in the backyard permitted the household to reduce the severity of food insecurity and, at the same time to reduce the expenditures on foodstuffs. But urban agriculture remained for this household a secondary source of food for as long as Kilambe’s husband was still working at TabaCongo. But from 1999 when Kilambe’s husband lost his job, urban agriculture became the principal source of food for the household. The backyard garden’s experience helped Kilambe to grow maize crop at the periphery of the city. She stated:

A friend of mine who was growing maize crop along Lubumbashi-Kipushi road encouraged me to start growing maize. I decided to do so. My experience in growing vegetables in the backyard was helpful for the growing of maize. The first year I produced only 3 sacs of maize (50kg). The following year (2001) with the help of my husband and children, the production tripled. I realized (9 sacs). Now I am able to produce 12 sacs of maize.

What started as a survivalist activity (on the backyard) has transformed into a real economic activity which produces not only food but also income, and therefore implicated much more members of the household (husband and children). Also, as much more space was needed for the extension of the agricultural activities, the periphery of the city offered the space needed for maize farming. While the main objective remained feeding the household members, the quantity of maize produced (12 sacs) allowed Kilambe to sell part of her produce.

Of 12 sacks of maize I produce annually, the family consumes 8 sacs because the four others are sold in order to generate an income which helps to meet the rest of family needs. It is not enough but it is much better than nothing. My family members can afford two maize meals a day.

Although the growing of maize brought a lot of benefits in terms of food and money, the Kilambe household did not abandon cultivating vegetables. On the contrary, the household rotated different types of vegetables, such as amaranth, cassava, marrow and sweet potato leaves and cabbages. Diversification and rotation of crops allow poor households to get food all over the year and to reduce risks of one crop production. As she acknowledged:

As you can see, I grow maize along Kipushi road and vegetables on backyard. In rain season I grow amaranth, sweet potato, marrow and cassava leaves and in dry season I cultivate cabbages.

The expenditures on foodstuffs have been drastically reduced, which means that as the household allocates less money to buy foodstuffs, the surplus money from food selling can be allocated to other needs of the household.

My family does not anymore buy maize flour and vegetables on the market. Sometimes I don’t know how much they cost on the market.

Even though Kilambe recognizes that her maize farm supplies the essential of food to the household, this is not enough to feed every member of the household at all times. Instead of three meals per day (breakfast, lunch and dinner), for example, the Kilambe household members get two meals a day.

To sum up, Kilambe household grows food crops as a strategy to fight against hunger. In order to increase the production, the household incorporates all members at a certain age, diversifies and rotates crops. Food production in the Kilambe household has reduced expenditures on food stuffs, but what is produced is not yet enough to cover all household needs. Additionally, household means being limited, therefore, a survival urban agriculture is the dominant type of farming practiced in this category of households.

Urban agriculture as source of enrichment: the Kadony household

Kadony household is part of the very rare farming households primarily engaged in food cultivation for commercial reasons. This household is an example of success in the practice of cultivation which started in the city to be extended later on in the rural areas.

Kadony is a senior lecturer at the University of Lubumbashi. He is married and a father of several children, Kadony engaged in the growing of maize, peanut, cabbages, onion and sweet potatoes for several reasons, namely; to supplement the low salary earned, to supply food to his household, and to finance his doctoral research. As he stated:

I have been cultivating since 1989. I started growing maize plant and later on peanut for home consumption. In 1989, I produced 8 bags of maize.

Considering the high level of profitability of peanut crop, Kadony household decided to produce much more. The result was far above his expectation.

1992-93, I produced 60 bags of peanut. After the selling, I was able to buy a return air ticket (Lubumbashi-Kinshasa) to meet with my supervisor for the follow-up of my thesis. I was in need of it. The purchase of a return air ticket and my stay in Kinshasa cost almost $US 2000. My salary at that time was tenfold less.

After the academic issue was solved, Kadony household decided later on to buy a second hand car as a unit of production for the household. The $US 3000 used to buy the car came from the selling of peanuts. Since then, the household does not experience food shortage.

In the three sources of household expenditures envisaged in Freidmann’s (1992) model of household economy, the buying of a car is a durable investment even though it is not directly affected to commercial use. In a case of crisis, the car may be sold and the money may help the household to move out the crisis. The acquisition of a second hand car increased the social status of the Kadony household.

In 1998, I bought a second hand car for commercial purpose. It cost $US 3000. Since then, my salary has become a secondary source of income in the household. It may be paid or not, I always have enough food to feed my household members and enough money to cover other needs of the household.

By buying a car for commercial purpose from the selling of agricultural products, the Kadony household like many households in this category increased the productivity of his farms by expanding the activities and hiring workers.

The food secure Kadony household shows that urban agriculture can move a household out of poverty, and more importantly this activity can become a sustainable livelihood strategy. However, very few households may be included in the category of the Kadony household.

To show how important urban agriculture is for his household, senior lecturer Kadony has been expending his agricultural activities outside the city.

It can be deduced from the above statement that the sustainability of urban agriculture is mostly dependent on the availability of land as agricultural activities expand, and also on material and financial support from government and development agencies.

Household strategies to food insecurity

From the three categories of households, it must be retained that urban households respond to food insecurity by using various ways. These vary from incorporating household members into food production to reducing the quantity and quality of meals. The multiplicity of strategies reduces the impact of food insecurity on the household. The table that follows illustrates both viable and survivalist as household strategies to food insecurity.

Table 1: Summary of household strategies to food insecurity

Viable strategies

Survivalist strategies

-Incorporating household members

-Diversifying food crops

-Rotating vegetable crops

-Attributing specific role to each crop (food, income generation)

-Eating sweet potatoes as food bridge

-Reducing the quantity and number of meals per day

-Suppressing some types of meals (meat, rice)

-Replacement of staple food (maize meal) by sweet potatoes

-Making vegetables as main condiments

-Elimination of some foods (meat, fish, etc)

-Eating late at night

Source: author’s fieldwork 2004/2005

Source: author’s fieldwork 2004/2005

The above table indicates that farming households use their members with an objective to increase the production. Kilambe for example, recognized that the engagement of her husband and children was helpful to triple the maize production from 3 bags (50kg) in 2000 to 9 bags in 2001. The increase permitted the household members to get two maize meals a day. Households often move from backyard to the periphery of the city or use land in the surrounding villages to expand their activities. The size of a plot determines the production.

The diversification of crops as well as the rotation system was practiced. On one plot two or three crops were grown. Maize crop might be the main crop, but was often associated with two other crops such as, beans and vegetables or peanut and vegetables. In the rainy season, households grew specific types of vegetables such as amaranth, beans, cassava leaves and sweet potato leaves, while in the dry season cabbages were the most cultivated.

Also, crop like peanut was specifically grown for commercial reasons irrespective of the quantity produced while vegetables were primarily grown for home consumption, but could also be sold. Maize crop was produced for both reasons: home consumption and income generation. Sweet potatoes played a major role in Lubumbashi residents’ diet during the period of food shortage.

On nutrition level, households were able to eat two to three maize meals a day during the harvest period. Three to four months later, only one maize meal was affordable by the majority of the households interviewed. When the household could not afford more than one meal a day, the time to eat the only one meal was late in the night (around 22:00).

The predominance of vegetables in Lubumbashi residents’ diet as the principal condiment was also one of the strategies used to reduce the impact of food shortage and high food prices in the household. As already pointed out, some foods (meat, fish, chips and omelet) were eaten only at special events (birth, marriage and death). The elimination of these expensive foods allowed poor households to survive.

To sum up, while some household strategies are viable and therefore sustainable (incorporating all household members, diversifying crops), others are just survival for (food reduction, replacement of maize meal by other kinds of meals such as beans and sweet potatoes, and the predominance of vegetables as substitute to fish and meat.

Gender in food and income generation

In the context of economic crisis characterized by growing unemployment and low income in public administration, the household plays a major role in the supply of food and income generation. The dominant presence of women in urban agriculture can be explained by the fact that women are often considered as caregivers and managers of household.

In the absence of salary or with a very little salary earned by their husbands (see Kilambe and Ngoy households), women are the ones who are supposed to generate an income and provide food to their households. They undertake, therefore, multiple tasks from planting food crops to selling agricultural products on the market. As stated by Van Esterik (1999), women’s sense of self is based on their ability to feed their families. This is to say that women loose their power and identity when they lack access to food.

Instead of losing their power and identity as caregivers and managers of the household, women are ready, in addition to their domestic chores, to undertake agricultural activities to supply food to their household members and to generate income. Two selected women of Bongonga area gave the following reasons to justify their engagement if food production:

My husband has lost his job, the only source of income. What you want me to do? I have to do something. If not, my children will die. I have to grow vegetables: beans, potatoes and marrow and sell part of the production.

With only $US 10 my husband earns per month, I cannot feed my family. I have got 8 children. I also keep nephews at home. To supplement my husband’s salary, I keep chickens and plant vegetables and maize.

Most of the women interviewed have recognized that their production was not enough to cover all the food needs in the household. Nevertheless, in the situation of food shortage, the only one maize meal consumed on daily basis is a sacrifice made by a woman. Whatever the quality or quantity of food consumed in the household, a meal means not only food, but also capacity for a woman to keep her family members alive and to prevent them from begging.

We generally eat once a day. Sometimes twice a day, but I am proud because I am the one who provides the one meal in the household. I cannot allow my children to become beggars (Interview 63, February 2005).

By participating to the production of food in the household and becoming the central producer and provider, the woman reinforces her status in the household. In the meantime, men are losing their position of head of the household. Women tend to decide on the way production must be used.

I don’t expect clothes from my husband. If he is not able to provide food to the family, you think he can be able to buy clothes. I buy clothes during the harvest time when I sell part of my maize (Interview 25, January 2005).

Women reinforce their status in the household not only by supplying food, but also by deciding on the allocation of the household income. As noted before, the reinforcement of women’s status in the household undermines men’s status. Sometimes this brings conflict in the household where men like to keep their position as head of the household. One of the respondents said;

Since I have been cultivating, I manage the household income. But my husband accuses me of not consulting him as head of the family. He does not know my priorities. When I get money, I like to solve the most important problems in the household for example, food, rent, and water and electricity bills. Sometimes he understands, sometimes he does not (Interview 79, November 2004).

Change of women’s status in a context of patriarchal system can be source of conflict. Since women have been having more power to decide, men feel powerless and tend to leave all the burden of the household to their wives. They explain their behaviour by the fact women want to rule the household, so they have to take all the responsibilities. A teacher did complain as follows:

I am a teacher. I earn $US 20 per month if I add the $US 10 I monthly receive as parents’ contribution to school. I supply food to family just for one week. The family depends on my wife’s activities. She grows vegetables and sells on the market. The problem is that she is the decision-maker in the household. I don’t see my place anymore. She has even forgotten the period I was supplied everything in the family, when I was working at Forrest Company (Interview 62, March 2005).

The significant contribution of women to reduce food insecurity at household level has the advantage to reinforce their status, but on the other hand it constitutes a burden on their shoulders. Loss of control over household income makes men powerless. As a consequence, family pressure is now more directed towards women than towards men. As one woman supported by World Vision International/Congo declared:

From 8:00 am to 4:00 pm I am at my maize farm. When I come back home, I have to cook and clean the house. I don’t have a domestic worker. I do everything myself. That is the reason why I am always tired. The only days I have a rest are Saturdays and Sundays.

Urban farming has become more central for the survival of households that some women work so hard they even sacrifice their own health. Petit’s survey (2001) conducted in the city of Lubumbashi showed that women’s contribution to the household income was very insignificant when the giant mining company (Gécamines) and other companies operating in its orbit were paying their employees. Unfortunately, the more economic crisis deepened the more women’s contribution to their household becomes central survival means particularly in food supply and income generation.

Conclusion

In the context of economic crisis with a weak state, the household economy is already becoming a response to food insecurity. The practice of cultivation in the city of Lubumbashi has rendered almost all selected households self-sufficient in vegetables through the techniques of diversification, rotation, and alternation all along the year.

Temporary food security (harvest) has also been observed concerning maize. During that period, two to three maize meals a day become possible. But it must be added that only very few households became food secure for the entire year (the Kadony household). The case of Kilambe household is in between the Kadony and the Ngoy household. While through urban agriculture Kadony household succeeded to move out of food insecurity, the Ngoy standard of life continued declining. Kilambe did not necessarily move out of food insecurity, but his condition was not declining. This category of households may become food secure and move out of poverty if a financial support is given to them. Therefore, the role of the government and development agencies is crucial. The case of urban agriculture in Great Gaborone (Botwsana), which through grants received from the government became an entrepreneurial activity, is illustrative (Hovorka, 2004).

References

Annual report of the agricultural service/Katanga province: 2002-2003 Denzin, Norman K. (1978). Research act: A theoretical introduction to sociological Methods. New york: Mcgraw-Lill
Feige, Edgar (1989). The underground economies: Tax evasion and information distortion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Fobre, Nancy (1994). Who pays for the kids? Gender and the structures of constraint. London: Routledge
Friedmann, John (1992). Empowerment: The politics of alternative development. Cambridge, Massachussets: Blakwell
Hill, M.R. (1993). Archival strategies and techniques: Qualitative research Methods Series. London: Sage
Hovorka, A.J. (2004). “Entrepreneurial opportunities in Botswana: (Re) shaping Urban Agriculture discourse”. In Journal of Contemporary African Studies, volume 22, number 3
Leedy, P.D. (1989). Practical research: Planning and design. Fifth edition. London:MacMillan
MacGaffey, Janet et all. (1991). The real economy of Zaire: The Contribution of Smuggling and Other Unofficial Activities to National Wealth. London: James Currey
Martinussen, John (1997). Society, State and market: a Guide to Competing Theories of Development. London: Zen
Petit, Pierre (2001). Lubumbashi 2000: La situation des ménages dans une économie de précarité. Lubumbashi: Observatoire de changement urbain
Polanyi, Karl (1977). The Livelihood of Man. New York: Academic
Reutlinger, Shlomo and Selowsky, Marcelo (1976). Malnutrition and poverty. [s.I]: Johns Hopkins University Press
Sawio, J.C. (1994). Who are the farmers of Dar es Salaam? In Cities Feeding People: an Examination of Urban Agriculture in East Africa. Ottawa: International Development Research Centre.
Sen, Amartya Kumar (1991). Poverty and famines: An essay on entitlement and deprivation. Oxford: Clarendon Press
United Nations Development Program (2006). Case study: The Democratic Republic of Congo World Bank (1986)

KM & Social Challenges

Knowledge Management in Fractured Societies: Women’s Initiatives

KMAadmin — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 00:14:23 -0600

Author : Dr Michele Ruiters (DBSA, Research Unit)

Abstract

Post-conflict societies experience a breakdown in institutions and relations between citizens. Most conflicts in Africa have occurred due to identity politics or politicized ethnicities; resource conflicts; and struggles for political power and representation in formal institutions. Whatever the reason for the outbreak of the conflict, social and political conflicts disadvantage women and children the most. Institutions fail, social networks are torn and governments struggle to disseminate information about services and programmes aimed at repairing the society and the relationships therein. All communication and management of information becomes problematic. In periods characterized as post-conflict, a number of women’s groups have taken the initiative to address issues of knowledge management to ensure that women receive the necessary information they require to conduct their everyday lives, especially in relation to their interaction with the government and social welfare services. Women’s organizations have employed a range of methods to inform women of services and to empower women to work within their communities in effective ways that support social, political and economic initiatives. This paper will firstly provide a theoretical foundation on the politics of knowledge production and management. It also conducts internet research on three women’s organizations in three post-conflict countries that are at various stages of reconstruction, namely, Zimbabwe, Uganda and Liberia. The paper finally will evaluate the ICT structures and networks that these women’s organizations have created, evaluate their levels of success and determine whether there is a distinct model that could be generalized across the region.

We the representatives of the world, assembled in Geneva from 10-12 December 2003 for the first phase of the World Summit on the Information Society, declare our common desire and commitment to build a people-centred, inclusive and development-oriented Information Society, where everyone can create, access, utilize and share information and knowledge, enabling individuals communities and peoples to achieve their full potential in promoting their sustainable development and improving their quality of life, premised on the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations and respecting fully and upholding the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.1

Introduction

The dictum ‘knowledge is power’ proves to be very apt when knowledge and gender intersect. In reference to this paper, access to and interaction with knowledge creates power. Despite international instruments that protect women’s access to the formal economy, political sphere and other public spaces, often the majority of women find themselves excluded from knowledge production processes because they either work from home; are employed in the informal market as self-employed traders; or are employed in low level jobs in the formal economy. Also, women are being left behind in the race for digital information. The gendered digital divide shows that more women than men have little or no access to information on the internet, world-wide web or through other electronic means. As globalisation connects everyone, women especially are being left behind as the digital divide increases between countries and people who have access to new media and technologies. Consequently, access to knowledge and information becomes a political issue especially since it involves exclusion from the public sphere.
This paper examines the concept of knowledge management through a gendered lens and traces the processes of creating and managing knowledge for women’s empowerment across three case studies from Zimbabwe, Uganda and Liberia respectively and assesses knowledge management tools in relation to their broad objective of empowering women. Most women’s organisations in Africa work on empowering women in their societies to become more engaged in development, political decision-making processes and to become economically self-sufficient. Their mandate is to communicate information that would contribute towards changes in women’s lived experiences and in so doing, change social practices to allow women to participate as equals. Information management and dissemination are therefore key strategies employed by these organisations in their attempts to inform their constituencies and to improve women’s socio-economic status. In post-conflict situations the social fabric of the country has been torn and networks destroyed. Women’s organisations in these fragile contexts then have to fight against hyper-sexism resulting in increased political, economic and physical insecurity for women. Women are empowered through receiving information that informs their decisions and involvement with larger social, political and economic processes.

Knowledge and Power

For decades, feminisms have argued for a particular standpoint grounded in women’s experiences; gender-defined roles cause women and men to view and experience the world differently. The concept ‘gender’ refers to both men and women, but for this discussion, this paper specifically looks at women’s experiences in relation to knowledge production and management. Knowledge production is affected by the concepts of race, class and nation; therefore, a woman’s position in terms of her race, her economic status and geographical location determines whether she has the ability to act as a political, social and economic being. Feminisms practiced by women of colour went further to argue that not all women are equal because of the racialised nature of society and the world economy2 and discourses that spoke about ‘Third World Women’ without their participation also maintain a power hierarchy through which those women are denied agency and re-colonised through knowledge production.3 It is therefore necessary to create spaces in which women can communicate their experiences and generate knowledge, manage that knowledge and pass it on as information to other communities generally and women specifically.

Public spaces are dominated by men and masculine voices who determine action and outcomes. The public space itself is complicated by the urban/rural divide that has a high incidence of poverty and a lack of resources. Historically women comprise the majority of the rural population because men migrated to cities for work, a trend that is evolving as an increasing number of women leave rural areas for potentially better lives in urban areas. However, their access to information and knowledge has not increased even if their location has changed. Political, social and economic marginalisation and the feminisation of poverty and labour maintain women in positions where they do not have the power to speak out, contribute to knowledge production or access information. The advent of new media has heeded the demand for an ‘[i]ncrease [in] the participation and access of women to expression and decision-making in and through the media and new technologies of communication’.4 Representatives at the World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva (2003) and Tunis (2005) affirmed their commitment to mainstreaming a gender equality perspective by means of ICTs.5 These initiatives acknowledge that women are not part of mainstream developments in the ICT field and focus on targeting women and other marginal groups for inclusion and development.

Location

Location is important in many ways. The representer’s political location in relation to the subjects she studies is imbued with the politics of representation. The insider/outsider dichotomy presents a myriad of complications as knowledge producers grapple with how they represent their subjects and whether they can speak for the ‘other’. Gayatri Spivak asks ‘Can the subaltern speak’ and answers no because often they speak through others through what Leela Fernandes refers to as a ‘colonial process of “information gathering” from “informants”’.6 The strategies of representation and knowledge production of ‘the other’ are vitally important as it bounds information within particular discourses of subject/object, informer/informant and reproduces relations found within larger systems of power.

For feminists, knowledge production involves new discourses that ‘sensitize us to the interconnections between knowledge claims ... and power’.7 Knowledge is thus integrally connected to power. In a critique against postmodern feminisms, Philomina E. Okeke argues that ‘intent on defending subjugated voices, dominant voices do not seem conscious of the relations of power that position them as “gatekeepers”, defining the insider and outsider even as postmodernism appropriates the voices of the latter’.8 This raises the question about who can speak for whom and how because ‘how what is said gets heard depends on who says it, and who says it in turn affects the style and language in which it is stated, and will in turn affect its perceived significance’.9 In this regard, postmodern feminists argue that women should speak for themselves and that each woman’s experience can be aggregated into a shared experience that is used for advocacy and rights-based action. Consequently, knowledge about African women should therefore be produced by African women in collaboration with each other and in the interests of a movement that could bring about social change. However, feminist knowledge is also embedded in class debates about what constitutes knowledge and where and how that knowledge is disseminated. Okeke argues for feminist scholarship that ‘affirms, even as it contests, particular knowledge claims’.10 If this does not happen, women’s voices are then sublimated in a discourse about what is allowed into feminist scholarship rather than creating the space in which women can speak freely about their daily lives.11

International Instruments and Knowledge Production

It is generally assumed that if an individual has access to information, she is empowered to make informed decisions about her life. Political scientists refer to this as making a ‘rational choice’. However, women were not deemed ‘rational’ or ‘objective’ because due to them being ‘irrational’ and ‘emotional’ were not capable of making informed decisions. Women were thus kept out of the deliberations about society, the polity and the public sphere. Voice and representation continue to be mainly limited to men in power, be it in the family, society or government. Social norms and values maintain women as the ‘silent majority’ on whom laws and policies are enacted. Despite many international instruments that promote gender equality and access to the public sphere, to mention a few, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) provides international benchmarks for gender equality12; the Millennium Development Goals advocate for an intensified focus on increasing education levels of women and girls by 2015; and, the UN Resolution 1325 that has resulted in the inclusion of women in peacekeeping and peacebuilding initiatives in conflict-torn areas, women are still excluded.

On the continent, when the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa (also known as the African Union’s Women’s Protocol) was ratified in November 2005, it committed signatories to protect and promote the rights of women in Africa. Each region on the continent has specific gender protocols, for example, the Southern African Development Community’s (SADC) Protocol on Gender and Development13 and the Economic Community of West African States’ (ECOWAS) Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance14. These provisions allow for programmes that target women’s development and also ensure that women are party to decision-making processes that influence the way they live their lives. In reality, despite all the instruments, women still continue to be excluded and, as a result, do not know about these milestone decisions that are taken at national and international levels because they do not have access to information or are not adequately informed.

Education has been targeted as an entry point for women’s development programmes because more women than men are un(der)educated. As Charlotte Bunch explains, reading and writing skills are vital to effect social and individual change:
First, [writing and reading] provide a means of conveying ideas and information that may not be readily available in the popular media. ... Second, reading and writing help develop an individual’s imagination and ability to think. ...Third, an individual’s access, through reading a variety of interpretations of reality, increases that person’s capacity to think for herself, to go against the norms of the culture, and to conceive of alternatives for society – all of which are fundamental to acting politically. Fourth, reading and writing aid each woman’s individual survival and success in the world, by increasing her ability to function in her chosen endeavours. And finally, the written world is still the cheapest and most accessible form of mass communication.15
Formal education is intricately linked with women’s empowerment as so many women are excluded from formal education programmes. In sub-Saharan Africa, the girl child and women are three-times more likely to be infected with HIV and AIDS than their male peers due to cultural and religious systems that prevent them from negotiating safer sex. Education and information have reduced the risk of infection by informing girls of their choices in intimate relationships; but, girls are still less likely than boys to finish formal schooling.16 Enrolment rates have increased since the adoption of the MDGs and National Action Plans that emphasise education as a tool for development, but in many cases, girls lag behind boys and, by implication, girls are most likely to be unemployed, silent and powerless in social and economic spheres.

It is widely assumed that knowledge gleaned through formal education would correlate with increased levels of agency among women. The 1988/9 World Bank Development Report regards knowledge as a necessary requirement for development to occur.17 As more women than men live in absolute poverty, especially in sub-Sahara Africa, more women need information and knowledge to be able to improve their socio-economic status in the region. By transferring information to women and closing the gendered knowledge gap, agencies and governments can involve more women in development work and in the public sphere and thereby contribute to more inclusive development outcomes. Organisations, movements and countries have to grapple with the ‘twin challenges of knowledge for development’, namely knowledge gaps and information problems.18 The WDR also talks about ‘beneficiary participation’ in the design and implementation of projects that would inform future World Bank operations.19 However, the concept of knowledge in the report engages with the production of indigenous knowledge through experience, but it does so inadequately without taking into account the power structures that are inherent in knowledge production: who produces knowledge; who has access; and how is it distributed.

Women and ICTs

For the reasons discussed above and the growth of new media, women’s movements around the world began to use Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) that they could access to create, manage and distribute knowledge. New ‘knowledge practices’20 began to evolve that were more representative of women’s lives. Janeway refers to the evolution of a new power as ‘the refusal to accept the definition of oneself that is put forward by the powerful’ while bell hooks later entreats women to ‘exercise the power of disbelief’ to create new realities.21 As mentioned above, knowledge production has occurred in places many women do not occupy: the academe, policy think-tanks and other public sphere organisations. In post-conflict states the public sphere is starkly devoid of women despite United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325. Those who produce knowledge in universities, colleges and other formal institutions often raise their theoretical endeavours above those whose work is practical. The theory/practice dichotomy stems from a false distinction between intellectual and non-intellectual work that has plagued feminist scholarship for decades. What constitutes knowledge is determined by mainstream debates on what qualifies as knowledge; exclusive attributes that are defined by those who are involved in fields of knowledge production. Women engaging in ‘non-intellectual’ work therefore have to become the producers of knowledge that is defined in more inclusive ways.

In this regard, women in non-governmental organisations that target women’s empowerment have the opportunity to engage with issues and to produce knowledge for their members and themselves. The practice of knowledge production therefore changes as the nature of the re-presenter22, the mode of representation and the audience change. New media has provided women with new modes of representation and often without a mediator as one sees in the case studies below. Criticism could be meted against new media for being exclusive as many rural women do not have access to or time for the internet, television or other electronic forms of communication. A counter argument to that criticism is that knowledge dissemination comes in many forms and ICTs are only one mode that on-line organisations are using. Women’s movements have to ensure that knowledge practices encompass all forms of knowledge production, management and dissemination to reach all their constituencies. What is important is that women receive the information, through dialogues, pamphlets, ICTs and so forth, that will lead to their full participation in the production of knowledge and decision-making processes, especially in post-conflict contexts.

ICTs are only ‘one tool among many required to support efforts towards women’s equality’ but regard it as a ‘critical site of intervention’.23 Other tools include infrastructure development; the provision of social services; access to the formal economy; gender equality, and so forth. ICTs have to complement other integrated development approaches. Often development is piecemeal and women’s needs are considered as an addendum. If development is meant to be successful, gender needs are to be considered in all stages of programmes and projects; thus, ICTs should be integrated as a means to convey information and to build community voices around important issues in communities.

Women around the world ‘face serious challenges – economic, social and cultural – that limit or prevent their access to, use of and benefits from ICTs.24 New technologies such as computers, the internet and established technologies like radio and television have a significant effect on who has access to information in a 21st century state. Cellular phones are yet to be used as mobilising tools in Africa but are very successfully used in global social movements. An international initiative known as the Know How community has assisted women leaders ‘to close the gendered digital gap, design social politics and produce information that can be transformed into knowledge by the appropriation of the ICTs’.25 ICTs work particularly well in post-conflict societies because they reach a greater mass of people than the conventional media, despite limited resources.
By and large, women are not involved in the decision-making processes of governments, companies and organisations. One notable exception, other than a marginal increase in the numbers of women in decision-making posts in these spheres, is in organisations that target women’s issues. These non-governmental organisations are run by women, led by women and for women, which makes them unique spaces in which women are fully engaged in all levels of decision-making. The apparent equality in women’s organisations does not remove the power dynamics that manifest in all organisations in general and women’s organisations specifically based on the position held, class, education levels, language, ethnic and other differences. Knowledge production and management therefore are affected by the culture and the philosophy of decision-making in the organisation.

Case Studies

Post-conflict countries provide a unique context in which gender relations are further skewed in favour of men. These three organisations are networks that have regional members or intra-country members that have experienced conflict in the last two decades. The three organisations each use ICTs to disseminate their information, but there are subtle differences that show a focus on regional versus national; rural versus urban; and sophisticated versus less sophisticated users. What follows is a brief synopsis of each organisation and final concluding remarks.

The Isis Women’s International Cross-Cultural Exchange (Isis WICCE) is now based in Uganda but was founded in 1974 in Geneva, Switzerland as an ‘action oriented women’s resource centre to meet the need for information by women from various regions of the world’.26 Its three programmes are in the areas of exchange, information and documentation and publications. Isis is the Egyptian goddess of knowledge. Isis WICCE moved to Kampala, Uganda in 1993 with the ‘objective of tapping African women’s ideas, views and problems and share the information with women at the international level’ and ‘contributes to the strengthening of Uganda and Africa’s women’s movement’ through the dissemination of information.27

Isis WICCE has various publications that cover an array of writing styles from reports, pictorial posters and flyers to audio visuals and on-line media. It also has an on-site Internet Café, a resource centre and hosts exhibitions. It provides access to information on many subjects that pertain to women’s empowerment in Africa and further afield. Their Exchange Programme Institute offers annual cross-cultural skills building programmes. The women who attend these courses come from all over the world and ‘use the space to learn from one another, share information, exchange ideas and acquire cross-cultural strategies and solidarity actions for addressing a diverse range of women’s issues, from the human rights perspective’.28 The Institute relies on a snowball effect of training a number of women in their programmes who then go out and train and inform others. Isis WICCE uses a range of tools that include dialogues, training programmes and ICTs.

The website has used sophisticated technology that limits access by those who are not ICT conversant. The information is viewed through hyperlinks on their Knowledge Exchange and Information Sharing website. The history of the organisation is also broken up into episodes of information that are opened by clicking on a ‘Prev’ or ‘Next’ button. Technology has been used optimally to display Isis-WICCE’s objectives, programmes and outcomes, but it is dominated by the assumption that its readers are ICT-literate and have access to the internet. Dralega critiques a project in Uganda that used ICTs and a CD-ROM to facilitate the learning and sharing of lessons of women in micro businesses for ‘derail[ing] from ascribed notions of African feminism; notably due to its top-down proponents’. 29 The risk is that nature of ICTs and their empowerment programmes could make women passive recipients of information rather than producers and managers of information.

The Mano River Women’s Peace Network (MARWOPNET), founded in 2000 in the Mano River Basin, incorporates women’s organisations from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. MARWOPNET’s mission is to ensure the participation of women and youth in ‘the prevention, management and resolution of conflict in the Mano River sub-region, throughout Africa and the world, to serve as a catalyst through which sustainable peace, human security and justice can be attained by ensuring gender responsive policies and building women’s/girls’ capacity for socio-economic, political empowerment and human development for all’.30 MARWOPNET is a network involved in regional peace and development issues. It is concerned with awareness-raising through the media; ensuring women’s participation in decision-making fora; providing training programmes; and arranging meetings with development partners, youth and other social networks.

MARWOPNET was instrumental in creating dialogue between the three governments of the Mano River basin, a process that led to a Heads of State Summit in Rabat in 2002. The Network also signed the Liberian Peace Accords in Accra in 2003 and was given observer status at the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) in December 2001. This Network mainly operates through meetings and dialogues rather than as an information hub. It does, however, have an on-line journal entitled ‘Voices of Peace’ that aims to ‘give voice to a diverse range of voices, particularly those of women, on peace- and conflict-related issues’ and ‘welcomes feedback from members, partners or other interested parties who would like to share their opinions, stories, letters, photos, or other materials for publication in the newsletter’.31 The testimonies, poems and drawings are first-person accounts of the horrors of conflict in the region.

‘Voices of Peace’ is an example of knowledge production and dissemination through an ICT medium. The information found on this website is a re-packaging of information as the individual’s words are placed in relation to other testimonies and poems. Layout of information also draws the reader’s eyes to particular information and photographs and drawings often attract more attention than a paragraph of words. MARWOPNET has managed to operate at the state level in the region and at the level of ordinary Mano Basin residents, which makes it an accessible organisation to a wide range of people in the region. Knowledge production’s power relations are therefore relatively reduced as two very disparate communities are brought together through the work of a single organisation. It appears that MARWOPNET is defunct as the website is no longer being updated and emails to the last-listed chairperson have not been answered.

The Zimbabwean Women’s Resource Centre and Network (ZWRCN) is a Harare-based ‘women’s information organisation with a focus on collection, analysis, processing and dissemination of information on gender and development. The organisation’s strategic interventions aim to empower women, strengthen inter-organisational networking of gender and development agencies and promote the women’s movement in Zimbabwe’.32 The ZWRCN was founded in 1990 by a group of Zimbabwean women whose aim was to ‘empower women through the provision of information’ through key objectives to collect and disseminate information; repackage existing information ‘in forms appropriate to users’; and fill information gaps.33 ZWRCN has a Gender and Information Programme that provides information from its programmes and other sources to its members and on the internet to a wider audience. E-discussions and Gender and Development (GAD) talks are held at regular intervals to bring women together to discuss issues that are pertinent to their development and empowerment. The GAD talks are held in a ‘free space’ in a ‘Secret Garden’ which could be analysed as a women-friendly space in which women can air their thoughts about their location in Zimbabwean society, their politics in a fractured (but hopefully healing) state and their dreams for empowering themselves and their families within a broader global context.

One special programme that ZWRCN runs is the stories of women told in their own words. In email correspondence with me, the Executive Director said the following:

I would describe ZWRCN as a knowledge and information producer. We manage knowledge in the sense that we make decisions through input from women about the knowledge that they require and we disseminate it according to needs. I would describe our work as definitely empowerment focussed because our information is used for women to make better decisions about their political, social and economic aspects of their lives. Different information/knowledge products use women's input. The stories that we publish are called 'I' stories and they have up to now [been] generated from research (of the experiences of women in their communities) and converted into a publication.34

This provides ‘ordinary’ women with the tools to produce knowledge from their own experiences; to manage that knowledge in a story and disseminate that knowledge through a medium that re-packages it and sends it out as information. The re-packaging of knowledge also constitutes a form of knowledge production as in inserting an ethical ‘witness’ who is implicated in the telling and retelling of the story that ‘breaks through the traditional hierarchies and relationships of power that governs how we see’.35

Conclusion

These three post-conflict contexts, in which ZWRCN, MARWOPNET and Isis WICCE provide women with information and the spaces to create knowledge, are not unique. Their models of knowledge production, management and dissemination can be transposed onto other contexts provided they are inclusive at every stage of the knowledge practice. The organisations provide interconnections between women and women’s organisations to share information and practices that are achieved through different modes of transfer, for example, pamphlets; meetings; e-chats; organisational websites; conferences; radio and television; and programme-related documents. There are African success stories where ICTs have had a significant impact on women and their development and these organisations have shown that impact on their websites. This paper argues that it is necessary to change the power relationships within communities, organisations and between people to ensure that gender equality is achieved and the ways through which we do that would determine whether or not that happens. ICTs could contribute to women’s empowerment but should only be one tool in a toolbox of approaches that ensure a holistic and integrated development programme. ICTs have to power to include as well as exclude and care should be taken to avoid exclusion. Structural and cultural changes would ensure that women gain equal access to the public sphere where most ICTs are located in Africa as many women live in the rural areas and are homebound. Finally, as Elizabeth Kiondo argues, ‘there is a need to strategically work towards eliminating the barriers and obstacles while exploiting the opportunities to make ICTs effective tools for women empowerment and the promotion of gender equality’.36

Footnotes & Bibliography

World Summit on the Information Society, Geneva 2003 – Tunis 2005. ‘Declaration of Principles: Building the Information Society: A Global challenge in the new Millennium’, paragraph 1. http://www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-s/md/03/wsis/doc/S03-WSIS-DOC-0004!!PDF-E.pdf
The racialised nature of the world economy has been termed ‘global apartheid’ in reference to the racial apartheid (segregation) that existed in South Africa prior to 1994. For more debate on global apartheid, see Charles Mutasa, 2004, ‘Global Apartheid Continues to Haunt Global Democracy’, Pambazuka News, September 9. http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/develop/debt/2004/0909globalaparthei...
See Chandra Mohanty, 1991. ‘Under Western Eyes’ in Chandra Mohanty, Ann Russo and Lourdes Torres, eds. Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, pp.51-80.
United Nations, 1995. United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women – Action for Equality, Development and Peace: the Beijing Platform for Action. Strategic Objective J.1. ‘Women and the Media Diagnosis’. http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/beijing/platform/media.htm
See World Summit on the Information Society Geneva 2003- Tunis 2005 for the ‘Declaration of Principles’ and the ‘Plan of Action’ http://www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-s/md/03/wsis/doc/S03-WSIS-DOC-0004!!PDF-E.pdf and the ‘Tunis Commitment’ http://www.itu.int/wsis/docs2/tunis/off/7.pdf
Leela Fernandes, 2003. Transforming Feminist Practice, San Francisco: Aunt Lute Books, p.81.
Jane Flax, 1990. ‘Postmodernism and Gender Relations in Feminist Theory’, in Linda J. Nicholson, ed., Feminism/Postmodernism, New York: Routledge, p.48.
Philomina E. Okeke, 1996. ‘Postmodern Feminism and Knowledge Production: the African context’ in Africa Today, 1 July, p.2 of 7.
Linda Alcoff, 1994. ‘The Problem of Speaking for Others’, in Susan Ostrov Weissner and Jennifer Fleischner, eds. Feminist Nightmares: Women at Odds: Feminism and the Problem of Sisterhood’, New York: New York University Press, p. 292.
Okeke, 1996, p4 of 7.
One example that is not without controversy is the research work on a Mexican woman’s experience of her life as an informal trader by Ruth Behar (1993) in Translated Woman: Crossing the Border with Esperanza’s Story, Boston: Beacon Press.
United Nations, The Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/text/econvention.htm
United Nations, The Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/text/econvention.htm
http://www.iss.co.za/af/regorg/unity_to_union/pdfs/ecowas/12ProtDemocGoo...
Charlotte Bunch, 1979. ‘Feminism and Education: Not by Degrees’, Quest, vol. V, No. 1 (Summer), pp.1-7.’ cited in bell hooks, 2000, pp.108-109.
A Factsheet from DfID on ‘Girls Education’ shows that ‘[o]ut of the 44 million girls out of school, at least 20 million live in sub-Saharan Africa’ p.1. January 2007. There are anomalies like in South Africa where girls’ primary and secondary enrollment in school is outflanking that of boys.
World Bank, 1998. ‘World Development Report 1998/9: Knowledge for Development ’, p.1. Washington DC. The summary document was used in this paper
WDR 1998/99, 1998, p. 6.
Ibid., p.13.
Fernandes, 2003, pg. 79
Elizabeth Janeway, 1981. Powers of the Weak, New York: Morrow Quill cited in bell hooks (2000), Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (second edition), Cambridge, MA: South End Press, p. 92-93.
I consciously use this term to denote the difference between the subject (the presenter) and the person representing the subject (the re-presenter).
Janine Moolman, Natasha Primo and Sally-Jean Shackleton, 2007. ‘Taking a byte of technology: Women and ICTs’ in ICTs – Women Take a Byte – Agenda 71, pp.4-14.
Ibid., p5.
Know How, 2006. ‘The Mexico 2006 Know How Declaration – Weaving the Information Society; A Gender and Multicultural Perspective’, hosted by Programa Universitario de Estudios de Género (PUEG) and UNAM, in cooperation with the Know How Secretariat, August 23-25, p. 2. http://www.gert.ngo-bg.org/IMG/pdf/Mexico_Declaration.pdf
http://www.isis.or.ug/about-us/brief-history
http://www.isis.or.ug/about-us/brief-history
Ibid.
Carol Dralega, 2007. ‘Rural women’s ICT use in Uganda: Collective action for development’, Agenda 71, 2007, p.46.
http://www.marwopnet.org/vision_en.htm
http://www.marwopnet.org/voicesofpeace.htm
ZWRCN website, http://www.zwrcn.org.zw
Ibid., http://www.zwrcn.org.zw/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=25&Ite...
Personal email correspondence, with Dorothy Adebanjo, 24 March 2009.
Fernandes, 2003, pp.83-84
Elizabeth Kiondo, 2007. ‘Millennium Development Goals: Challenges and opportunities for using ICTs to promote gender equality in Africa’, Agenda 71, p. 25.

KM & Social Challenges

Technical, vocational education and training in Africa: has it lost its significance?

KMAadmin — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 10:25:33 -0600

Author: Grace Wairimu Mureithi, Moi University, Kenya

Abstract

Technical, vocational education and training (TVET), has been used by several developed countries as an instrument of development. However, in Africa, TVET has been left to the periphery and its significance has not really been embraced. Studies show that, in Africa funding towards TVET is ad hoc and arbitral, TVET training centers have been neglected or overtaken by institutions concentrating on purely academic education. In addition people tend to view TVET in a negative way, as education and training meant for those who have failed in the society.

Ironically, Africa has on one hand a relatively large percent of skilled yet unemployed people. This is as a result of declining employment in the public and private sector. On the other hand, Africa has a large cheap unskilled labor force, as a result of lack of education and training. However, the core role of TVET in enhancing the informal sector and in offering skills and knowledge to the unskilled has not been keenly appreciated in Africa.

This paper arises from practical observation that the significance of TVET in contributing to knowledge and skill acquisition in Africa is often ignored. Thus, the paper endeavors to discuss the current condition of TVET in Africa. The paper will critically observe the role of the African states and organizations in TVET. The paper will also attempt to underscore the importance of TVET in Africa today. The paper will also attempt to give suggestions on what African states can do to draw from the enormous benefits of TVET especially in this era of knowledge economy.

Introduction

To enhance productivity, stimulate competitiveness, and bring about economic development, skill development is important. Technical vocational training and education (TVET) is the provision of skills, knowledge, attitude, and values needed for the place of work. In contrast to general education, learning in TVET is centered on applied as opposed to academics, practical as opposed to theory, and skills as opposed to knowledge. TVET is meant to prepare learners for careers based on manual and practical activities (Amkombe, 2000). Technical, vocational training and education relates to a specific trade in which the learner participates, hence the term vocational, while technical means that learner directly develops expertise in a particular group of techniques (Tum, 1996).

Skill training is critical for sustainable industrialization and poverty reduction in terms of creating a critical mass of technically and entrepreneurially qualified people, who are able to stimulate investment opportunities, create jobs and increase productivity. A well educated and trained workforce is a prerequisite for harnessing the potential of competitiveness and industrialization (Rao, 1996).

Therefore, the question on whether technical vocational education and training is still significant deserves an answer. This paper attempts to answer this question. Considering the myriad problems facing Africa, TVET is not only important, it is a prerequisite. We start by critically reviewing some of these problems and how TVET could be used in alleviating them. Then we look at the current condition of TVET in Africa, carefully discussing the limitations to the growth of this sector before embarking on suggestions on the way forward.

Importance of TVET in African Countries

Armstrong (2003) defines training as the formal and systematic modification of behavior through learning, which occurs because of education, instruction, development, and planned experience. Training and capacity building for both men and women is a key priority for poverty reduction in order to address the lack of appropriate skills and capacity both within the private and public sectors.

Basically, if people lack in technical skills, knowledge and entrepreneurial skills, the natural resources will tend to remain unutilized, underutilized or even misutilized.

Jhingan, (1985) argues that undeveloped human resources are an important obstacle to economic development of the least Developed Countries. According to him, the economic quality of production remains low when there is little knowledge of available natural resources, possible alternative production techniques, necessary skills, existing market conditions and opportunities, and institutions that might be created to favor economizing effort and economic rationality. Today more than ever the role of training and especially post-primary training is critical because of the changes taking place in the world. Rapid technological changes and globalization have made training of the workforce a prerequisite in any nation that wishes to survive.

Rapidly changing technologies involve a whole set of individual, organizational and societal factors. Changes in technology emphasis the need for more complex cognitive skills, ‘a strong back and a weak mind will not permit any nation to compete in today’s market place,’ (Goldstein and Ford, 2001). Goldstein and Ford argue that it is not simply a matter of literacy skills but the need for complex thinking skills. These include abilities to assess information, understand work systems, deal with new technologies as the workplace changes and develop interpersonal skills. These are in addition to the 3Rs of reading, writing and arithmetic. Increasing ‘smart’ machines increases the cognitive complexity for the human being. Jobs increasingly become complex due to technological and sophisticated systems.

The increases in technology require a highly trained workforce to design and operate the systems. Rapid changes in technology development require a continuous learning philosophy. A commitment to training and continuous learning is therefore crucial for the labor force to remain competitive (ibid). The rapid changes in technology are compounded by movement from an industrial to a knowledge society; in an industrial society, the workers do not own their tools. But in a knowledge society, workers carry their own knowledge both in their head and in their computer and they transport it from job to job, thus, rapid changes in society fueled by technological developments calls for training systems that promote and deliver high quality just-in-time training (Rothwell and Kolb, 1999).

Globalization refers to the growing economic interdependence of countries worldwide, through increasing volume and variety of cross-border transactions in goods and in services and of international capital flows and the rapid and widespread diffusion of technology (Richardson, 2001). Due to globalization, the world has become a large village and this is reflected in nations, enterprises and in the life of workers. Globalization has both positive and negative impacts on economies. For weaker economies, globalization may cause them to go worse from effects of intense competition. Richardson argues that in a global economy, the hitherto accepted ‘infant industry economy’ will no longer be sustainable. Globalization will lead to mega-competition and may ‘hollow out’ industries and have major impacts on labor markets.

To counter the impacts of globalization, every country must invest in human capital. Investing in training leads to acquisition of skills that raise labor productivity and allow widespread use of existing technology, in addition training allows promotion of new technological development. Globalization places a lot of pressure on not only the economies but also the enterprises and individuals to become competitive. Higher level of skills is therefore a core factor in enhancing and enabling the necessary response. Training is therefore required continuously through out working life to enhance employability of the individual and collectively the flexibility of the workforce. This means that training should equip people with skills and competences they require to be employable or to create their own jobs.

TVET has the capacity to offer this much needed practical training in Africa to meet the challenges brought about by technological changes and globalization. African countries face a myriad of problems that cause or are a cause of underdevelopment. Among them are rural-urban migration, unemployment, theoretical based education systems and declining jobs in the formal sector. These are not the only problems facing African countries; however, these are important to this paper because they can be mitigated by the development of a well established TVET system. Next, this paper will briefly look at these problems against the background of the potentiality of TVET to alleviate them;

Rural-Urban Migration
Two models have often been used in explaining the forces behind rural-urban migration. The lewis- Fei-Ranis model of development and the Todaro migration model (Todaro, 1992). The former model argues that underdeveloped economies consist of two sectors (1) a traditional agricultural subsistence sector characterized by zero or very low productive ‘surplus labor’ (2) a high productive modern urban industrial sector into which labor from the subsistence sector is gradually transferred. This model basically argues that the structural and economic differences between the rural and urban sectors are the fundamental cause of rural- urban migration.

Todaro migration model, argues that the fundamental premises causing rural-urban migration are (1) the differences in real incomes between rural and urban work and (2) the difference in the probability of a new migrant obtaining an urban job. Thus people migrate to the urban areas with a belief that their income in the urban areas would be more and that there is assurance of a job in the urban areas. Unfortunately, these assumptions are made in the face of high rates of urban unemployment. Often, urban migrants tend to be young men and women between the ages of 15 and 24 (ibid). Continued rural-urban migration leads to rural underdevelopment and an influx of surplus labor in the urban areas which results to open unemployment in the urban areas.

An emphasis on TVET, in which trainees are offered skills aimed at rural development like farm related skills and knowledge, establishment and sustenance of small and medium enterprises directly related to rural needs and demands can go along way in curbing rural-urban migration. This way, individuals would have skills to keep them occupied in the rural areas.

Unemployment and Declining Job Opportunities in the Formal Sector
Largely attributed to rural-urban migration, overpopulation and poor economic policies that do not stimulate job creation opportunities, unemployment is another major problem facing African countries. Open unemployment in urban areas affects 10 to 20 percent of the African labor force. Unemployment is much higher among the young and increasingly more among educated in the 15 to 24 year age bracket, (Todaro, 1992). In Kenya, for instance, according to the Economic Survey, the youth constitute 64% of the population which culminates to 45% of the Kenyan labor force (Kenya, 2003). This has led to high dependence ratio standing at 92% per every economically active person, again the majority being the youth who constitute 52% (Ibid).

Currently, most economies in Africa are facing a decline in job opportunities in the formal sector while the informal sector is increasingly becoming the source of employment. In Kenya, for instance, in 1999, public sector employment declined from 36% to 21% and in the private sector, from 54% to 24% while in the formal sector employment increased from 65% in 1997 to 72% in 2001 (Kenya, 2005). In the year 2000, the informal sector contributed 18.5% of GDP. A study on growth and competitiveness in Kenya by the World Bank (2004), found out that out of a total of about 500,000 people employed in Kenya’s manufacturing sector, 56% were in the informal sector.

The informal sector has a lot of potential to create jobs, develop future entrepreneurs and to produce quality and attractively priced products. Unfortunately, there is consistent lack of adequate and appropriate technical and vocational skills in this sector, this limits its ability to contribute in the creation of jobs and income generating activities and also affects the quality of goods and services produced reducing their competitiveness in a global market. A combination of an ineffective education system and decreasing job opportunities has led to a gloomy situation in which as job opportunities become scarce in relation to the number of applicants, students tend to proceed further up the education ladder in attempt to join urban jobs, however with each passing year; the students join the ranks of the “educated unemployment”.

TVET has the potential to curb high rates of unemployment especially among the youth and women. By offering hands-on skills, TVET has the potential to offer the much needed skills to develop the informal sector. Individuals would then be in a position to develop self employment thus reducing pressure put on the few available jobs in the formal sector by a high level of graduates from the academic education. By offering skills, especially directed towards rural development, TVET would reduce the surplus labor flocking to the urban areas from rural areas and causing high levels of unemployment.

Theoretical Based Education System
The education system adopted by most African countries emphasizes exclusively on literacy, numeracy and the learning of foreign languages (English and French). This method of instruction places emphasis on recitation, repetition and memorization. The current system of education in most countries is highly theoretical and lacks practical bases from which students can develop technical skills and capacity do meet the challenges of the African economies today. In most cases, the concepts and theories learnt are not applicable. In Kenya, vocational and technical subjects are not offered especially at the primary school, at the secondary school level, vocational subjects are offered as elective subjects and a student may choose only one of each. Most common are art and craft, home science and music. Girl schools will rarely offer mechanics and engineering courses. And even where these subjects are offered, little emphasis is placed on them. The appropriate equipment may be lacking and students only sit for examinations in these courses to fill the necessary units, but not to be furthered or pursued in career development. As such, the education system favors general academics, with the curricula being biased towards the achievement of white collar jobs. Thus, for students destined to spend their lives working in rural areas, for persons engaged in farm and non-farm enterprises and for small subsistence farmers, the current education system offers minimal attention and contributes little towards assisting the individual to function effectively in his or her community.

In addition to the existence of an education system that emphasizes on formal education leading to urban white collar jobs, it is saddening to realize that the national completion rate is very low. For example, In Kenya, at the primary school level only about 45 % or 225 000 proceed to secondary education, at the end of secondary education, only about 20, 000 of the nearly 200,000 candidates join university (Kenya,2003). Thus, quite a large number of young people do not complete the general education cycle. This creates a huge number of young people who lack appropriate skills required by the labor market. Consequently, this increases the dependency ratio.

A well established TVET system would go along way in covering up the gaps curved out by the education system currently in existence. TVET is meant to offer applied, practical skills to the trainees. A well developed TVET system will offer a chance to those students who are more comfortable with practical as opposed to theoretical education. It will also be an alternative to those who drop out of the general academic cycle, for example the youth polytechnics in Kenya, established to cater for class eight drop outs.

However, although TVET offers training that has all these potential, we must remember that it is not a panacea to them furthermore, the capacity of TVET to realize its potential in African countries is limited by a number of factors as this paper discusses next.

Critical Analyses into the Limitations of Technical, Vocational, Education and Training in Africa

Within this section, this paper will critically analyze the current condition of TVET by looking at the limitations that have hampered the significance this sector from being realized:

The debate on whether the TVET institutions lead to rural development or whether, rural development leads to development of TVET institutions is synonymous to ‘the egg and the chick ‘debate-what precedes what? Development of TVET in rural areas meant to offer skills aimed at providing local solutions to local problems would go along way in curbing rural-urban migration, while at the same time offering skills leading to self employment thus alleviating unemployment. However, the role of TVET in promoting rural development is over-ambitious. In Kenya, for instance the Youth Polytechnics were established on the idea that they were to contribute to rural development. Studies (Owiro and Migot, 1981: Fergusion and Barker, 1990: Matanga, 1992) show that the role of youth polytechnics tend to depend on the pre-existing levels of rural prospects.

The level of poverty in the rural areas affects the ability of the community members to support TVET institutions and trainees. Matanga, (1992) asserts that in a poor community there will be difficulties in raising funds, school fees, in creating employment, providing contracts and even in buying goods and services from the trainees.

It is common to find that most industries are found in the urban areas, thus, if the trainees are to be attached to the industries in order to get on the job training during industrial attachment, then trainees have to transfer from the rural to urban areas, thus as long as all the industries are situated in urban areas, TVET institutes situated in rural areas may miss to offer industrial attachment to their trainees. In addition, in most rural areas, important facilities such as water, electricity, roads are missing; this may limit the scope of training offered to trainees in the rural areas.

The belief that skill acquisition through TVET will lead to creation of jobs especially in the informal sector through self-employment instead of job-seeking is also over-ambitious. This is because self-employment is faced with sharp competition and sluggish economic growth especially in the rural areas, it is also undermined by great competition from urban industrial goods and imported goods. Presence of unfavorable political and economic policies leads people into seeking rather than creating jobs. It must be appreciated that skill acquisition does not create jobs; the prevailing economic policies must be favorable for the skills acquired to be applicable in the creation of jobs.

The potential of TVET is also greatly limited by the low government investment towards this sector. Rao, (1996) observed that in most developing countries the ministries responsible for running and directing these centers are either not equipped to pay attention to this aspect or are pre-occupied with other sectors of education leaving the TVET at the mercy of market forces.

A study for the World Bank by Ziderman (2002) found out that virtually all training systems in Sub-Sahara Africa have to deal with the reality of diminishing government funding for public sector training. Funding towards TVET programs is ad hoc and arbitral, leading to year after year variations and uncertainty.

Management of TVET institutions is also wanting. In Kenya, for instance, the management is spread across different ministries with for example the youth polytechnics under the ministry of youth affairs, the National Youth Service under the office of the president among others. according to the sessional paper No 1 of 2005, having the management of TVET institutions under different ministries makes coordination of activities and maintenance of training standards difficult, it leads to duplication of efforts, conflict of jurisdiction, underutilization of available training facilities, wasteful and unnecessary competition and costly irrelevant training programs (Kenya, 2005).

Under investment in TVET sector is also made worse by the emphasis placed on the general academic sector by the government. For instance, in Kenya, according to the National Development plan on education, training and capacity building, for the period 2002-2008, the budget allocation to TVET under sub sector of education and training was about 0.7% of the recurrent expenditure.

The Germany system of vocational training (commonly referred to as directed and dual system) has frequently been referred to as an example of excellent practice of technical vocational education and training (Beardwell and Holden, 2001). Employers fund two-third of the training and together with trade unions and the local government, they have a considerable influence on the control of the system. Laws and guidelines of vocational training and education regulate the system so that employers are duty bound to provide funding and resources for training. Employers’ unions and the state administer the institutions and procedures that operate the system jointly. Firms pay for on-the-job training, youths accept relatively low wages, and the vocational colleges are paid for by public funds (Beardwell and Holden, 2001).

Although it would be expensive to transfer the Germany’s dual system as a whole or in component to Africa, it is important to note the influence exerted by organizations on funding for the on the job training and in regulation of skills being offered. In African countries, organizations’ influence in the running of TVET is almost zero. TVET is entirely a responsibility of the government and especially the trainees.

The growth of TVET sector is also limited by the negative attitude exhibited by people towards vocational training. Many people tend to relate TVET especially the vocational part of it to failures. A study by Mureithi (2008) on the challenges facing youth polytechnics in Rift Valley province, Kenya found out that parents believe that only those who fail to make it to the secondary schools should be admitted to the Youth polytechnics. Well, this notion may arise from the idea upon which TVET was established. The youth polytechnics for instance were established ‘to complete the unfinished business of primary school’ (Tum, 1996). Continued offering of courses considered ‘traditional trades’ also causes most people to view vocational training negatively. Kerre (1995) concedes that, generally efforts at providing effective TVET in Africa have not succeeded and vocational training still receives low status.

Another major limitation to the potentiality of TVET in Africa is the quality of training offered in the TVET institutions and the quality of trainees graduating from these institutes. Rao (1996) argues that the poor quality of training may be attributed to problems which include:

lack of responsiveness of the curriculum to the changing labor market
Decline in teaching standards
Lack of maintenance facilities and equipment
Lack of research and development
lack of dialog with the employer

The TVET sub-sector in Kenya for instance is characterized by; inflexible and outdated curriculum, a mismatch between skills taught and those demanded by the industries, inadequate quality assurance mechanism, inadequate physical and learning resources and low participation of the private sector necessary to bridge the school-work gap ( Kenya, 2003). Afenyendu et. al (1999), observe that the institutions are still not responsive enough and simply lack a culture in which training is driven by determination or realistic projections of future skill requirements. In agreement is a report on The Rapid Appraisal on the Status of Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) in Kenya (Kenya, 2003) which observed that the quality of TVET graduates was fast declining at all levels due to out-dated equipment, poor instruction, lack of work experience and meaningful supervision. In addition, the report observes that the TVET system in Kenya is not demand driven; attachments and linkages to industry are fragile, poorly planned and inadequately supervised. Poor quality of training resulting from lack of appropriate (qualitatively and quantitatively) tools and equipment and the poor inflexible curricular in TVET institutions, may be attributed again to the low level of investment by governments and organizations towards the TVET sector.

Globalization and its effects on African economies especially in terms of trade also limit the significance of TVET. As seen before, globalization has led to stiff competition that is indiscriminative and does not spare even the young economies. Globalization invites not only the international transfer of goods and services, but also the influences of the transfer of production technologies and consumption patterns that decrease the demand for products and services from the TVET sector. African economies are forced to import products from abroad because they are cheaper and of higher quality than those produced inwardly. This has strangled the growth of TVET because there is hardly any market for their products.

Conclusion

The question still floating in our minds is ‘in the 21 century, does Africa need TVET? Is it significant?’ This paper concludes that in spite of the limitations put afore, the significance of TVET to the development and industrialization of African economies cannot be overemphasized. Africa needs to be more inventive and innovative in a way she can develop solutions to her problems internally.

The indiscriminate adoption of foreign technologies and theoretical concepts of the developed countries is a misnomer, this is because we must appreciate that the developed countries industrialized and developed within different contexts and circumstances that differ from the context and circumstances facing African countries today. TVET thus remains significant because it provides an opportunity to develop practical solutions to African problems, based on a thorough analysis of the prevailing conditions.

A well established TVET system should lead to the development of technologies that are tailored towards meeting the needs of the community. However, it must be accentuated that acquisition of skills is not sufficient to eliminate all the problems facing African economies. It is a prerequisite, but a lot more needs to be executed. Political instability, poor governance, poor economic policies and unequal distribution of income among other ills must be abolished if the significance of TVET is to be felt.

Suggestions on the Way Forward

In the foregoing discussion, it is evident that the significance of TVET is not being felt in Africa because of the limitations facing this sector. Thus, this paper suggests that;

There is need for increased funding towards TVET in Africa. This should be directed towards research and development, acquisition of appropriate and up-to-date equipment and tools and general maintenance and management of TVET institution.
More attention or equal attention should be offered to the TVET sector as that offered to the general academic education.
There is a need to emphasis on rural development in order to reduce income differences between the urban and rural areas. Thus, those with technical and vocational skills will not have the urge to transfer their skills to already overpopulated urban areas where their skills become unutilized. In addition, more TVET institutions should be established in the rural areas and they should emphasis at providing technical and vocational skills to meet the needs of the community.
There is also need to look into the economic policies upheld by our countries. Ways and means in which capital can easily be obtained by those with entrepreneurship skills but are unable to start income generating activities due to lack of capital should be established. governments should encourage the development of micro finances and also through their national commercial banks offer friendly loans to even the poor and young entrepreneurs willing but unable to establish money making activities.
Although the effects of globalization are inevitable, governments need to develop policies that protect their economies against harmful importation of products and services that discriminate against those goods produced internally. This can be achieved by looking inwards and encouraging domestic production to substitute for imports.
To ensure that TVET is more market driven, it is necessary for the governments to involve organizations in the formulation of the curricula and in the certification of skills offered. In addition the governments should encourage organizations to participate in providing on the job training by creating incentives for companies by reimbursing training costs, by subsidizing apprenticeship wages and for those companies who earn huge profits, by allowing for tax concessions.
Bibliography
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7. Kenya, (2005) The executive summary of the paper on ‘The role of education and training in transforming Kenya into a newly industrialized country by the year 2020. Nairobi: Ministry of Education, Science and Technology
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10. Matanga, F.K. (1992) The role of youth polytechnics in rural development. The case of Bungoma District
11. Maundu (1997) Towards meeting local training requirements of jua kali artisans in Kenya: some lessons of experience. Florida: Florida State University
12. Mureithi, G.W (2008) challenges facing vocational training centers in human resource development: the case of Youth Polytechnics in Rift Valley Province, Kenya
13. Rao, T. (1996) Human Resource Development, Experiences, Interventions and Strategies. New Delhi: Sage Publications
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20. Ziderman, A. (2002) Financing vocational training to meet policy objectives: Sub-Sahara Africa.The World Bank

KM & Social Challenges

Climate change and AIDS: A joint working paper

carol — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 23:40:05 -0600

AIDS and climate change (CC) are two of the most important "long wave" global issues of the recent past, the present and the future. They share similarities, interactions, and present possibilities for a more united response. Yet these links have received little analysis. This paper seeks to address that gap. It first focuses on scientific issues, identifying major, minor, and speculative pathways by which AIDS and CC are likely to interact. These interactions are, here, called the HIV and Climate Change Complex (HACC).

The maximum impact of CC is in the future, likely to occur decades after the peak incidence of HIV. The severity of the HACC will largely be determined by the temporal overlap of these ranges. The HACC will also have an uneven spatial distribution, modified by the regional impact of CC and the regional epidemiology of AIDS, each of which varies by physical and social elements. Populations with currently high rates of HIV are the most vulnerable to a worsening or prolongation of the epidemic due to CC.

This places the people of SSA at the greatest risk of the HACC, though outside Africa populations in north east India and New Guinea may also be significantly impacted.

There is agreement that the most important pathway in the HACC will be further deterioration of regional and global food security. At the individual level, nutrition is vital for good immune function, to reduce the risk of acquiring HIV if viral exposure does occur, and to slow the progression of HIV to AIDS and of AIDS to death. At larger scales, population nutrition is important for good governance, by helping to nurture and stimulate the "effective" demand populations need to reduce corruption and to more evenly distribute available resources. Any substantial decline in the availability and intake of calories or micronutrients brought about by CC is likely to increase poverty, impair learning and expand the number of migrants. The current decline in global food security, partly attributable to CC, is already causing disproportionate nutritional harm to migrants and otherwise impoverished populations, some of whom experience AIDS.

There is agreement that the second major pathway of the HACC is the CC-related alteration in the distribution of infectious diseases, which interact with AIDS. Of these, malaria is the most important, due to its high burden of disease (BOD). CC is projected to reduce malaria transmission in some regions, which experience a comparatively low rate of HIV, both now and in the future. This will reduce the beneficial impact to the BOD of AIDS for these populations. On the other hand, a large population with a high rate of HIV lives on the plateaus of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), an area as yet little affected by malaria. If the climatic, eco-systemic and other factors for malaria transmission alter sufficiently in these plateau cities then the HIV burden of this population is likely to be substantially higher, and will also be worsened by increased poverty and greater food insecurity.

There are several other plausible biological pathways in the HACC. Of these, the relationship between CC, air pollution and immunity, and CC, heat stress and immunity are likely to be the most important. More speculative is the possibility that that CC will harm infrastructure and governance on a scale sufficient to aggravate and prolong the BOD of AIDS. Again, the population of SSA is judged to be at the highest risk. This mechanism is plausible by interlinked pathways including more extreme weather events and "natural" disasters, increased mobility and additional migrants and refugees. These factors are also likely to aggravate gender inequalities, increasing the frequency of transactional and coercive sex - pathways likely to increase the BOD of AIDS among women and girls, via increased viral transmission and reduced access to treatment and prevention. At the global level, CC may exert an immense opportunity cost, diverting resources of the international community away from public health, including from HIV, poverty alleviation, and the other Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

Suggestions for a future research agenda include the more accurate assessment of the pathways within the HACC, and an improved conceptual understanding of the linkages between conflict, behaviour, governance and values, environmental factors including climate, and food production, and between each of these macro-elements and sea level rise. This would be best done by an interdisciplinary working group.

Another research gap is the effect of CC on human behaviour, including behavior related directly to HIV risk. From science, the paper moves to strategies and policies. The struggle to address AIDS and CC has generated two vigorous global social movements, with, as yet, little formal interaction or collaboration. We suggest this gap is a microcosm of a separation between two even larger communities - those concerned with the environment and those concerned with social justice. Of course, this is a simplification, but on the whole our perception is that the environmental movement is insufficiently aware of poverty, while the social justice movement is still poorly informed about the environment. The work, advocacy and activism of the leaders and actors within each community who do recognise these linkages will be strengthened by this report.

AIDS has already killed tens of millions of people, while CC may dwarf this number. Those concerned to reduce CC can apply many lessons learned by the AIDS community. These include the need to challenge conventions and to seek benefit for the poorest and most marginalised - and to widen the CC movement's emerging engagement with entrepreneurs, philanthropists and prominent personalities: tools instrumental in the growth of support for those with HIV. The AIDS constituency can benefit from the experience of humanitarian programmes, some of which already see AIDS and CC as cross-cutting issues.

Several actions to reduce the impact of CC on AIDS are proposed. These include the integration of HIV prevention and management into disaster management plans, particularly for populations in SSA, some of whom have already experienced extreme weather events. Means to enhance global and regional food security, especially in SSA, are vital, and much more can be done. A quarter of the world's population is over-nourished, and a more equitable distribution of global food production will go far to defusing any future food crisis, and is likely to improve health for both over and under-fed people. Malaria treatment and prevention in SSA can also be improved. The CC community might also consider strengthening the UNFCCC including with formal links with agriculture, health and security.

Finally, a risk is perceived whereby a relatively privileged stratum of people and interests argue that issues of global health and global social justice must be put aside in the effort to pursue partial CC adaptation. This approach is highly dangerous for global health and global social cohesion. It would also likely generate profound longer-term risks for currently privileged populations pursuing this strategy. A stronger alliance between the AIDS and CC communities will help thwart the emergence of such a policy. A focus on the interconnections between CC, food security, AIDS, health in general and the links between these and the MDGs is key to breaking out of this "either or" myopia."

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

The Malawi Religion Project

carol — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 23:35:32 -0600

Scholars have recently become increasingly interested in the role religion plays in the responses to the HIV/AIDS epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa. Here, we present the Malawi Religion Project (MRP), which provides data to examine the relationship between religion and HIV/AIDS through surveys and in-depth interviews with denominational leaders, congregational leaders and congregation members in three districts of rural Malawi. In the paper, we outline existing perspectives on the religion-HIV/AIDS link describe the MRP s design, implementation and subsequent data; provide initial evidence for a series of general research hypotheses; and describe how these data can be used both to extend explorations of these relationships further and as a model for gathering similar data in other contexts. In particular we highlight the unique possibilities this project provides for analyses that link MRP data to the Malawi Diffusion and Ideational Change Project. These linked data produce a multi-level data set covering individuals, congregations and their communities allowing empirical research on religion, HIV/AIDS risk, related behaviors, attitudes and norms.

author: jimi adams
co-authors: Jenny Trinitapoli
title: The Malawi Religion Project:
subtitle: Data collection and selected analyses

Demographic Research Official Website

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

How boosting smallholder farming can ease hunger and reduce poverty at the household level in southern Africa

KMAadmin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 02:40:48 -0600

This policy brief looks at the factors constraining the productivity of smallholder farmers to achieve food security for poor households and communities, as a contribution to poverty eradication in southern Africa. The brief examines the characteristics of the region in terms of poverty, the state of food security in the region, and current factors that limit smallholder farmers’ capacity to produce more food in a sustainable way. It also identifies key policy areas for attention and makes recommendations to address policy gaps.

Information Provided by the Southern Africa Trust Website

KM & Social Challenges

Farm ponds for water, fish and livelihoods

carol — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 03:23:52 -0600

Aquaculture has been recognized as an important component of rural development, aimed at improving food supply and generating more income for poor farming households. Ponds add value to farming activities: water from ponds can serve
domestic and livestock water supplies as well as irrigation for crops. Raising fish is an obvious use for a farm pond; it adds value to the water and provides improved nutrition for farm families. Smallholder farms ponds can be viable and sustainable
enterprises with appropriate targeted assistance. Planned and implemented interventions can facilitate assistance that makes farmers self-reliant rather than dependent on the public sector, NGOs and donors. The benefits can be:

organised and better informed farmers
progressive farms that are self-sustaining
higher and sustained productivity
marketable surpluses
higher family earnings

The multiple use of water from ponds needs to be understood so that it can be used to produce farm products and meet domestic needs. Farmers also need advice on effective use of resources and input of nutrients as well as training
and institutional support.

The booklet suggests ways in which smallholder farmers can participate in the market economy and work with the private sector. Diversification of livelihoods for smallholders that includes farm ponds involves, among others: integration
of water supply to the farm, understanding local knowledge of integrated farming with several farm enterprises, and understanding the farmer's circumstances and capabilities so they can get the highest possible benefit while minimizing risks.

Authors: Miller,J. Produced by: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2009)

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Rainwater harvesting: a lifeline for human well-being

carol — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 03:20:52 -0600

The aim of this report is to compile a synthesis of experiences that can provide insight into the multiple opportunities rainwater harvesting can have when addressing human well-being, while continuing to sustain a range of ecosystem services. This synthesis of linkages between ecosystem services, human well-being and rainwater harvesting interventions examines 29 cases from diverse economic and environmental settings.

Water supply of the right quality and quantity is essential for productive ecosystems and human well-being. The increasing demand on water resources for development whilst maintaining healthy ecosystems puts water resources under pressure.

Rainwater harvesting is an intervention that enables development and human well-being without undermining ecosystem services. Rainwater harvesting is a local intervention that improves equity, gender balance and strengthens social capital in
a community.

Rainwater harvesting is discussed from an ecosystem perspective and has positive benefits in both rural and urban areas. It employs a variety of methods to better manage water resources for many purposes including more water for domestic supply and for increased crop production. It also regulates and supports the ecosystem by reducing soil erosion, improving groundwater and spring supplies and increasing diversity among flora and fauna. In urban areas, pressure for ground and surface water is reduced.

Nevertheless, the implementation of rainwater harvesting should be limited in areas subject to water stress. Additional rainwater harvesting may affect other uses of water so assessment of impacts on ecosystem services and human well-being is needed.

In all cases studied, positive effects were mentioned in at least one of the four categories of poverty, income, health and gender. Negative impacts were mentioned in relation to heath, gender, and equity of labour. An additional positive effect for rainwater harvesting interventions was for rural domestic and agricultural uses as it built human and social capital.

Rainwater harvesting gives increased opportunities to manage all water resources and is a coping strategy in areas with variable rainfall. It should be seen as an important component in water management strategies and plans and as a complementary and viable alternative to large scale water use in emerging water-stressed basins.

Produced by: United Nations [UN] Environment Programme (2009)

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website

KM & Social Challenges

Factors associated with attitudes towards intimate partner violence against women

carol — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 01:06:58 -0600

Factors associated with attitudes towards intimate partner violence against women: A comparative analysis of 17 sub-Saharan countries.

Background: Violence against women, especially by intimate partners, is a serious public health problem that is associated with physical, reproductive and mental health consequences. Even though most societies proscribe violence against women, the reality is that violations against women's rights are often sanctioned under the garb of cultural practices and norms, or through misinterpretation of religious tenets.

Methods: We utilised data from 17 Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) conducted between 2003 and 2007 in sub-Saharan Africa to assess the net effects of socio-demographic factors on men's and women's attitudes toward intimate partner violence against women (IPVAW) using multiple logistic regression models estimated by likelihood ratio test.

Results: IPVAW was widely accepted under certain circumstances by men and women in all the countries studied. Women were more likely to justify IPVAW than men. "Neglecting the children" was the most common reason agreed to by both women and men for justifying IPVAW followed by "going out without informing husband" and "arguing back with the husband". Increasing wealth status, education attainment, urbanization, access to media, and joint decision making were associated with
decreased odds of justifying IPVAW in most countries.

Conclusion: In most Sub-Saharan African countries studied where IPVAW is widely accepted as a response to women's transgressing gender norms, men find less justification for the practice than do women. The present study suggests that proactive efforts are needed to change these norms, such as promotion of higher education and socio-demographic development. The magnitude and direction of factors associated with attitudes towards IPVAW varies widely across the countries, thus suggesting the significance of capitalizing on need-adapted interventions tailored to fit conditions in each country.

Authors: Olalekan A Uthman 1,2,3, Stephen Lawoko 1 and Tahereh Moradi 4 Institutions: 1 Department of Public Health Sciences, Division of Social Medicine, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden; 2 Department of Public Health & Biostatistics, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK; 3 Center for Evidence-Based Global Health, Ilorin, , Kwara State, Nigeria; 4 Department of Environmental Medicine, Division of Epidemiology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden Source: BMC International Health and Human Rights 20 July 2009, 9:14.

Information Provided by Carol Lombard, Department of Social Development Population Website