Date: Thu, 14 Oct 1999 08:57:33 -0400
From: Yacine Khelladi <[email protected]>

THE FOLLOWING TEXT HAS BEEN WRITEN BY CHIVHANGA BM AND FORWARDED TO LISTA MISTICA BY YACINE KHELLADI

Hi all

How are you all doing wherever you are. I only joined the discussion list last week. At the moment I am a PHD Candidate at City University where I am also a web manager and teaching assistant in the Department of Information Science. In my PHD research project, I am developing a model that can be used to produce electronic information resources that can impact on socio-economic development (see below). The area of focus is Africa - mainly looking at Internet technologies and their impact on the information environment. Before joining City University I worked as a lecturer, multimedia designer and publisher among other jobs in London where I have been based since 1989.

Basically the project that I have been undertaking involves developing a model that can be used to produce electronic information resources that can impact on development. The model in many respects values that information and knowledge are the keys to development and their production and dissemination becomes a determining factor in their impact. While there are many approaches to developing information resources, my study based (just yet) on my secondary research reveals a lot of missing gaps. This is true of the content on the web that is meant to benefit people at grassroots level. As yet I haven't come across watertight models that take into account the socio-economic characteritics of the communities in those settings in the pre-production stages.

What prompted me to undertake this research is the realisation that the information gaps between social groups in those settings is growing at an alarming rate and very little is being done to work out practical strategies that the information needs of people at grassroots level can be met using Internet Technologies, in particular before even making the information available to the wider community.

Starting off from the traditional systems development cycle I have focused on a model that delves into assessing the information needs of the users well before the development of the resource.

The next stage of the project will involve validating the model by developing an electronic resource on a user community in Southern Africa. The resource will be used to support an income generation activity. Impact assessments will be carried out as part of the evaluation exercise. The assessments will seek to demonstrate the value of information and how the Internet can be used in its delivery to achieve socio-economic development goals.

Hope to be of use in the discussion forum.

Cheers for now.

Mike

http://funredes.org/mistica/english/emec/production/c4/0030.html
Last modified: 14/10/1999