[kictanet] Universal Access in Kenya (Is it really working?)

Tue Dec 7 09:46:23 EAT 2010

Edith et. al.,

This makes for very interesting reading; I am also very concerned about this 
Universal access issue...even the simple understanding of what it means to those 
who are supposed to provide it and ultimately to the consumers. I go back to two 
of Tim's questions that I would also like to get responses for:

1. What happens to those operators who  ignore this "invitation" or do not roll 
out "enough" in line with their  revenues? 

2. What is the role of the regulator (has mandate for USO) in all  this?

I also want to add the concern Edith has about not going back to the old 
telecentre models (enough lessons learnt about many that failed), there is 
enough empirical evidence to show why these cannot work. The challenge is that 
many people have not clearly understood the Digital Villages concept...I would 
like to write more about this but I think this sentence says it all. I also 
agree with Edith that we need more innovation in the way we are dealing with 
this Universal Access issue. I do not think the problem is lack of 
innovators...innovative ideas for roll out...Kenya has plenty. The real problem 
is.................

I rest my case,

Nyaki

________________________________
From: Edith Adera <eadera at idrc.or.ke>
To: elizaslider at yahoo.com
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
Sent: Mon, December 6, 2010 1:32:42 PM
Subject: Re: [kictanet] Universal Access in Kenya (Is it really working?)

Bwana Ndemo,

It would be nice to get a definition of what we mean by digital villages? 

I would want to imagine that this  does NOT mean a traditional telecentre model 
(with one-point access). Communities have since moved on to innovate and build 
their own networks bottom-up! What we refer to as the first mile. So you have a 
“cloud of connectivity” which can be used to connect various corporate and 
individual users under that “cloud” rather than the traditional one-point access 
centre. Local skills are used to design, build and maintain the network, to run 
it as a social enterprise (on business terms) and to link it to development 
outcomes. 

I’ve attached a presentation I made last week in S. Sudan to show how this has 
been done in Nigeria, Uganda, Angola, SA, Mozambique and Zimbabwe. In Uganda, we 
also established a community wireless resource centre at the Electrical 
engineering dept of Makerere University to integrate the training into the 
University curriculum, to provide ongoing technical backstopping to the 
community deployments and also to offer short-term courses for ordinary citizens 
to acquire skills in community wireless networking. So you can grow local skills 
and critical mass quickly! This is now institutionalized and running way beyond 
the donor funding.

Tanzania has an interesting community-owned fibre model using existing fibre 
owned by the Water company – the dark fibre is in use to provide connectivity to 
neighboring villages! (this is a partnership between the Science and technology 
council of TZ and a Swedish University). The TZ fibre model is very impressive – 
given we have lots of fibre lying idle along railway lines, power lines, water 
companies, NOFBI etc

We need more innovation than we are putting our UA funds to…this will help reach 
UA much faster while building local skills! I worry about our approach to UA. 
And can we have more “public domain” feedback on UA in Kenya (it’s too quiet!). 

Edith

From:kictanet-bounces+eadera=idrc.or.ke at lists.kictanet.or.ke 
[mailto:kictanet-bounces+eadera=idrc.or.ke at lists.kictanet.or.ke] On Behalf Of 
bitange at jambo.co.ke
Sent: Monday, December 06, 2010 12:46 PM
To: Edith Adera
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions
Subject: Re: [kictanet] Universal Access in Kenya (Is it really working?)

Prof.
I am in the US till the 15th. The committee is chaired by Paul and cmposed of 
the operators and CCK. Please ask Paul how far they have gone. We did in such a 
way that they become the losers if they dfo not deploy but let us hear from 
Paul.

Ndemoz.
Sent from my BlackBerry®

________________________________

From: Mwololo Tim <timwololo at gmail.com> 
Date: Sun, 5 Dec 2010 20:33:54 -0800
To: <bitange at jambo.co.ke>
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions<kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
Subject: Re: [kictanet] Universal Access in Kenya (Is it really working?)

Hi Dr. Ndemo,
Thank you for the information. I am aware of the DV development by Safaricom and 
I have had discussions with the persons involved. What about the other operators 
and service providers? Is there a requirement for them to spent a certain 
proportion of their revenue on DVs, in line with the way US cointributions are 
calculated? What happens to those operators who ignore this "invitation" or do 
not roll out "enough" in line with their revenues? What is the composition and 
mandate of the committee you mention? What is the role of the regulator (has 
mandate for USO) in all this? These are some of the issues that bother me. 
Regards. tim
On Fri, Dec 3, 2010 at 2:34 AM, <bitange at jambo.co.ke> wrote:
Listers,
I am on record several times complaining the slow pace by the World Bank to 
release the funds for the Pasha project.  I am told that this will happen in 
January even though their pilot projects are operational.

This did not stop us from advancing the digital village concept.  We invited the 
operators to roll them out in return for not paying the first year USF.  One 
operator has already rolled out 500 of these DVs.  There is a committee in place 
to help the rest of the operators roll out.

IBM conducted a study on DVs to help further develop the value proposition.  As 
a result we have key corporations willing to participate.  For example CFC 
Stanbic want their online share trade to be on DVs.

The challenge we have is getting entrepreneurs from every constituency.  Most 
regions folks expect grants.  The resources available are for revolving funds. 
 In other words loans to set up the enterprise.  There is plenty of loanable 
resources from Youth and Women Enterprise to the world bank.  Our people must 
get to understand risk and enterprise.  Individually we must spend all our 
energies to educate our people.

I must state here that the last time we advertised, 95 percent of the 2000 
applications came from one ethnic group.  We could not move for obvious reasons. 
 I would hope in future listers seek to understand the problem before rushing to 
making conclusions.  At this time of our development we must emphasize evidence 
based decisions.

We are talking to MPs to assist disseminate some of these information.  Our 
Parliamentary Chairman Hon. Eng. Spends most of the time explaining and 
encouraging MPs to sensatize their own people.  We cannot for for example to 
North Hor and put up a DV without willing people to run it.

On NOFBI I do not know what you are talking about because I know some operators 
are using the network and it is managed by TKL.

Ndemo.

Sent from my BlackBerry®

-----Original Message-----
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Date: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 10:36:25
To: <bitange at jambo.co.ke>
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions<kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
Subject: Re: [kictanet] Universal Access in Kenya (Is it really working?)

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