Network Facilitation Training Workshop (9 - 10
Sep 2005)
First meeting for the Harambee Focus Networks
(12 - 13 Sep 2005)
NEW.......NEW.....NEW.......
ICT Partners
Reflect on Africa’s Infrastructure Challenges
Mercy
Wambui/ECA
Members
of Partners in Communication and Information Technologies
for Africa (PICTA) and Global Knowledge Partners (GKP) began
a two-day meeting on 7 September 2005 in Addis Ababa, to reflect
on “Making Infrastructure and Access Efforts in Africa
More Effective”.
More
>
NOTICE:
Rate for Sheraton Addis for 9th and 10th of September
has changed to US$ 244 per night due to the Ethiopian
New Year celebration at the hotel.
Organisations
confirmed to participate at the event include Aspiration,
USA; Association for Progressive Communication (APC); Bellanet
Africa; Bellanet International Secretariat; Catalysing Access
to ICTs in Africa (CATIA); Connectivity Africa; Fantsuam Foundation,
Nigeria; Global Knowledge Partnership (GKP); ICT4D/IDRC, Canada;
International Institute for Communication and Development
(IICD); Ministry of Communications and Information Technology
(MCIT), Egypt; National Productivity and Competitiveness Council,
Mauritius; Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA);
PROTÉGÉ QV, Cameroon; Regional Information Technology
and Software Engineering Center (RITSEC) – Youth Programme,
Egypt; SchoolNet Africa; Social Development Department/ JICA;
Youth for Technology Foundation (YTF), Nigeria.
The
2005 annual PICTA meeting will take place in Addis Ababa,
Ethiopia from 7 - 8 September 2005 under the theme of Networking
Development in Africa. This year the core PICTA partners are
expected to put extra effort into strengthening PICTA as an
arena for collaboration among the key institutions involved
with ICT and Knowledge for Development in Africa. To achieve
this goal the annual meeting will be joined by GKP Africa
members and held as a PICTA-GKP meeting. The participation
is expected to initiate a non-donor/ donor interaction and
provide a good opportunity to encourage the two collaborations
to cooperate and avoid duplication.
The
meeting will be informed by the experience of the 2003 PICTA
meeting in Tunis, which used the Open Space methodology to
facilitate the creation of a range of collaborative project
ideas, a number of which have come to fruition since then.
This methodology helps to create the conditions for participants
to organically identify synergies with others and, through
the articulation of their own priorities, encourage real partnerships
to happen.
Network
Facilitation Training Workshop, 9 - 10 Sep 2005
[Overview]
The
Network Facilitation Training Workshop that would take place
from 9 - 10 September 2005, will follow the PICTA-GKP meeting.
This is done in the interest of giving participants greater
opportunity to combine attendance. The main theme of the Network
Facilitation Training Workshop is "Deepening Regional
Networks and Linking Them with Global Networks for Greater
Impact".
The
workshop will be oriented toward giving participants training
in participatory facilitation methods for face-to-face meetings,
linked with the use of ICTs such as WIKIS in order to help
produce outputs as the meeting is taking place. The special
methodology that will be used for this workshop is currently
being prototyped in Canada by IDRC with the sponsorship of
Telecenter.Org. The workshop targets three main groups - GKP
Africa members, Telecentre.org partners and the Harambee project
focus networks.
More
on GKP >>
First
meeting for the Harambee Focus Networks, Sep 12 13,
2005
[Overview]
The
“Harambee: Reinforcing African Voices through Collaborative
Processes” is a PICTA initiative created by APC, Bellanet
Africa and UNECA. The project intends to build on existing
research and experiences in designing and implementing collaborative
processes and technologies. It will assist the project proponents
to both support specific networks and communities, and to
help the proponents themselves increase their respective capacities
to support their existing partner networks and communities
more generally.
The
objective of this meeting is for Focus Networks to develop
action plans on how and in which areas the Harambee project
can assist them in the next 1 2 years. Participants
will focus on their own respective networks and on the areas
(such as facilitation, knowledge sharing, etc.) for which
they feel the greatest need and the greatest opportunity for
development through the Harambee project.
