In a confused world where defence is a priority and governments spend billions on arms deals and weapons, one developing country has dared to be different and pumped its resources into its most valuable asset — its people.
Costa Rica recently disbanded its army and decided to channel funds earmarked for the military to its people by spending it on researching ICTs.
Speaking at the opening of the Cyber Festival in Geneva on Monday 8 December, José Maria Figueres, Costa Rica’s president and United Nations information and communication technologies taskforce chairman, said, ‘It was a democratic exercise meant to improve the connectivity of the people who have the least in their lives. We are using information as a tool for development, therefore moving in the direction of the information society.”
Figueres believes that local content, generated by the communities themselves, is the key to success.
‘Local content means enhancing the development equation and a lot still needs to be done to give all people the chance to be empowered, and we can go a long way by implementing technology to develop societies,” he said.
‘Information travels to people, not the people to the information. This gives people time to be more productive in other areas of their lives.”
But it is not that simple, Figueres admitted, and for him, that missing ingredient is finding ways to bring the hardware and the software to life.
‘Local content: that is the soul,” he said, ‘that is the life that is needed.”
Costa Rica has already started work. ‘Little intelligent communities is what we call them,” said Figueres, referring to the successful, NGO-driven Lincos programme.
‘The idea is to enhance communities to develop local content and empower them to create their own software. Not just any software — software with a difference.”
‘This not-so-normal software helps explain in local languages how, for example, to use ICTs in the natural environment. That way we help teach our children the importance of working hand-in-hand with our environment — a valuable resource.”
The software produced is used in as many fields as possible, including education and medicine.
Figueres hopes to take this project to the newly created United Nations ICT taskforce, the first of its kind in the UN. The taskforce is made up of representatives from the three broad areas of society — government, civil society and business. These groups will be holding talks at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).
‘It has taken a long time for all these groups to work together, but we are gaining momentum and already cover six regions of the world,” said Figueres. ‘We shall continue to find ways to aid the building of local content.”
Figueres hopes the WSIS will achieve its goal of finding ways to ensure information travels to the people.
‘I am pleased to see that society is organising itself in a different, phenomenal kind of way, coming together to work under the different challenges that face the world today.” – Hana