http://funredes.org/mistica

MISTICA: Re: Development Gateway ICT4D Topic Community

From: John Daly ([email protected])
Date: Mon Apr 15 2002 - 09:15:17 AST

Daniel Pimienta wrote:

>The question of the relationship between the World Bank originated project
>"Global Development Gateway" and the grassroots of ICT4DEV has been
discussed in
>Mistica several months ago. As you probably know, the majority of field
players
>has rejected what they considered an unfair and wrongly focus (top down)
action
>in their field which turn to be more a competition than a complementation...

I am a long term reader of the Mistica listserve, and I appreciate the work
that
has been done (on a small budget). I have read the discussion of the
Development
Gateways.

As a consultant I am also working part time on the development of the
programs of
the Development Gateway Foundation, as well as serving (pro bono) as an advisor
on a couple of topic pages on the DG Portal. Thus I am interested, but I am
certainly not a spokesperson for the Gateway.

As to the governance of the Gateways, I hope that now that there have been a
couple of meetings of its Board of Directors, the Foundation will be more
independent of the World Bank. As the Governments of India and Korea have
agreed
to appoint members of its Board of Directors, and as the President of Mali has
accepted a post on the Board, it seems to me that the Board will be
independent.
The Country Development Gateways are separate organizational entities, and I
think it is likely that they will not be subordinated to any central control.

There are some things that the DG Portal has done that could probably not
be done
without World Bank support. The AIDA data base, with more than 300,000 project
listed seems one. The developing procurement site is another. (The Gateway has
also opened up an Open Source page, to encourage added collaboration.)

There is a certain circularity in terms of participation and the community the
Gateways will serve. The GD Portal is open to all, and will grow and change
according to the user population. If people from civil society and NGOs don't
participate, the Portal will increasingly represent the interests of the
participants from other segments of the development community.

In any case, I am sure the individual Mistics will make their own
decisions, and
I hope some will chose to participate in growing the DG Portal. 

--
John Daly
http://www.geocities.com/stconsultant/

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