Lab Visits

On the morning of Feb. 5 - the day following the successful 2010 Euro-Africa Cooperation Forum on ICT Research - some 30 Forum delegates took the opportunity to visit ICT-related activities in Addis Ababa. Participants in the Technical Visits tour were from both Europe and Africa, and included a handful of Ethiopian delegates eager to learn more about their own region’s activities.

The first visit was to EthERNet, the Ethiopian Educational Research Network. EthERNET is a National Research and Education Network (NREN) that has expanded to include 21 Ethiopian universities and research centres. It aims to ensure that partner institutions have efficient and affordable bandwidth for their ICT activities such as tele-education, tele-medicine and digital e-library services so that they can participate in global research and education networking. The new facility, hosted by the University of Addis Ababa, is still expanding and, among the services currently being provided, is tele-education. Thanks to EthERNet, some 200 students in Addis receive real-time video lectures from professors at the Indian Institute of Technology in New Delhi, India. Thanks to these video-conferencing services, students can interact with their professors in such subjects as chemical engineering and receive quality training that would otherwise be unavailable in Ethiopia.

The second site visited was the Information & Development for Persons with Disabilities Association (IDPDA) ICT centre, also close to the University of Addis Ababa campus. Established with the support of ICT-Assisted Development, a programme of the Ethiopian government with World Bank backing, IDPDA supports the visually impaired, deaf and other persons with disabilities (PWDs) communities around Addis through basic computer training to increase access to and awareness of ICTs, as well as to create employment opportunities for PWDs. The centre has 10 computers for training and two for public use plus internet access. Two of these computers use Jaws (talking) software. Two women instructors provide training 3 days a week on MS Windows, MS Word, MS Excel, MS PowerPoint and the internet. Since the centre was established, 56 people with disabilities have graduated in the basic computer skills, including two who are without limbs (people with special needs). IDPDA is planning various expansions to activities in 2010, including a ‘talking book ‘ room and a Braille printer, as well as training for PWDs wishing to start their own mobile phone maintenance businesses.

The final visit was to the Computer Refurbishment and Training Centre (CRTC), located 20 km from the centre of Addis on the road to Djibouti. At present, there is a shortage of affordable computers for education, health and community services in Ethiopia. This represents a missed opportunity for socio-economic development and puts the country and its people at a competitive disadvantage. High quality pre-used computers (donated by developed countries) processed and deployed in a professional and responsible manner can provide a sustainable solution to this problem. CRTC, another ICTAD project, was established in 2005 and its new buildings are about to be inaugurated. To date, some 20,000 computers have been refurbished and distributed throughout Ethiopia. The centre also provides a the venue for training in computer refurbishment and maintenance. Although the start-up phase of the CRTC is coming to an end (it was a 5-year project) the centre is self-sustaining as income generation fully covers operating costs, recovery of investment, and end-of-life disposal costs. During its 5-year lifetime, CRTC has also set up four ICT business incubators in different towns in Ethiopia -- that have led to the establishment of some 50 start-up companies.

All three Technical Visit sites were viewed with enthusiasm by the Forum participants and many opportunities for either replication - and even collaboration with the Ethiopian hosts - were identified.