Meraka Institute in IST-Africa collaboration to close the Digital Divide

The Meraka Institute has teamed up with two European partners and government agencies from Mozambique and Tanzania, in the Information Society Technologies (IST)-Africa project. Aimed at improving the digital infrastructure of Sub-Saharan Africa, the IST-Africa project is the Meraka Institute’s first research endeavour that involves collaboration and funding from the European Union.

The project will build capacity on the African continent, in the spheres of eHealth, eLearning and eGovernment. This objective will be achieved through the development of training modules, case studies and comparative country research reports.

The partners held their first board meeting at the Meraka Institute on 11 and 12 July 2005 where they had an opportunity to present their training modules and provide inputs for module customisation to suit their own countries.

Training and dissemination will take place in the form of 10 workshops, to be held throughout the country with relevant target groups. International conferences in Africa and Europe have also been planned to serve this purpose.

The first workshop, focusing on eHealth, will be held with the Eastern Cape’s Health Department, in East London during September.

The project will also provide a framework for European and African researchers to explore opportunities for cooperation under the European Framework Programme six (FP6) and European Framework Programme seven (FP7).

Pictured at the recent board meeting are participants in the IST-Africa project: Front row L to R - Saloshni Naidoo (Meraka), Ajay Makan (Meraka), Zauria Saifodine (Mozambique) 2nd row L to R - Miriam Cunningham ( EU), Paul Cunningham (EU), Kobus Roux (Meraka) 3rd row L to R - Lourino Chemane (Mozambique), Madelein van den Berg (Meraka), Llew Jones (Meraka) Back row L to R - Robert Spiteri-Staines(EU), Chris Morris (Meraka), Laurens Cloete, (Meraka) Missing from picture - Hamisi Nguli (Tanzania)