The Building Digital Opportunities (BDO) programme is a package of cross-sectoral initiatives to address key barriers and opportunities for ICTs in achieving development targets. The programme is funded by the Department for International Development (DFID) of the United Kingdom, the Directorate-General for International Cooperation (DGIS) of the Netherlands,
and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC),
and its five key areas of activity are:
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Strengthening local capacity in developing countries to address policy and regulatory environments.
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Supporting a programme of demand led pilot projects, implemented as part of an ongoing series of stakeholder ICT roundtable processes in selected developing countries.
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Supporting information inclusion for the poor through activities on community media and linking old and new ICTs.
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A strategic partnership with a global 'development' Internet partner.
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Knowledge and research activities in key areas to support the above programme.
The programme has been put together as a partnership involving several participating organisations. They are:
and of course
As part of the BDO programme, OneWorld has started to conduct case studies to help give decisionmakers a clear understanding of how civil society is actually using information and communications technologies, and what the impact is. The cases studies are OneWorld partners. They were not selected for being success stories; rather they were likely to help identify the positive and negative impact ICTs have. A brief explanation of
the methodology is available.
Over a dozen organisations in South Asia, Southern Africa and Central America will be profiled. Their activities vary from offering wireless communication equipment to tribal nomads and teaching slum children how to use a computer, to training NGOs how to build a website and online broadcasting of radio programmes. By using the same structure and definitions, the conclusions on impact and sustainability are fairly comparable.
Please visit this page often to see the latest case studies, which will be published at least twice a month.
