[Telecentres] RE: [Telecentre's] Basic Telecentre Items

[Karin Delgadillo Poepsel]

Hi to everybody,

I was reading some of the postings regarding what is a telecentre. While 
I do agree in some issues that Don expressed. I want to highlight based 
on my experience of working directly with impoverished groups and 
grassroots organizations that  the use of a  telecentres to attend their 
demands and needs. In my experience it does not exist a model. It 
depends on the dynamics of a community to community. Not on the dynamics 
of the telecentre because the telecentre is just a tool to full fill the 
needs and demands of a community.

In some telecentres specially if you read the state of the art of 
telecentres in Latin america and the Caribe you will find that it exist 
telecentres with no tele. Connectivity is still and issue to sort out 
problems specially in urban marginalize areas and rural areas. The high 
costs of communication in Ecuador are the biggest challenge. But it did 
not stop the use of digital technologies in the community to attend 
their demands as an instrument linked to their own ways of 
communciation. So you find telecentres with no tele (no connectivity) 
and  they are doing a good use of it and a strong impact in the community.

I want to highlight in the list of a telecentre the social use of it to 
attend their demands. How do they use a telecentre as an instrument to 
access to medicaments, food, reduce violence, work with people who are 
disable and give them real opportunities of job and raise their 
standards of living, access to education, health services among others 
if the communities highlighted as a need. You also can find stories and 
examples in how a community use a telecentre when they are going through 
a problem
As I learn more of the failures than from the success, one of the 
biggest mistakes that we did is to give importance to the instrument and 
not the dynamics of the community and their needs, that is why we 
confuse what is a telecentre and a cybercafe :-). The other mistake si 
that we talk the same works but the meaning is aboslutelly different. We 
are advocating inside somos en telecentros to call somos en comunity using 
telecentres. Because the telecentre is just the instrument and nothing more.
I also want to highlight that some of the countries specially the 
northern ones has money to support community base telecentres and the 
money came form the government. In our cases are the community who are 
finding tools to attend the demands and NGO's are doing the work of the 
government. The biggest agenda of connectivity have failed in most of 
the countries because they are still searching for a model that is 
profitable and they are not looking for the sustainability model that 
works in the communities based on their human capital. Sustainability 
for us is social, political, technological and financial based on the 
mission of the telecentre to attend the needs of the community. More 
information and examples you can find in the following url.
www.tele-centros.org/tcparaque  click english version
We gathered stories and experiences of community base telecentres in the 
region as well. Hope this illustrates better.

karin
Board member of somos en telecentros
Latin American and the Caribbean
Community base telecenters network
www.tele-centros.org



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