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Title: RURAL TRANSFORMATION BY THE ESTABLISHMENT OF COMMUNITY INFORMATION CENTERS(CICs) IN THE RURAL AREAS OF NEPAL:A PILOT PROJECT
Location:
Categories: Technology
Peace & Conflict
Human Rights
Status:
In Progress
Timeline:
January 1 00 to January 1 00
Description:
RURAL TRANSFORMATION BY THE ESTABLISHMENT OF COMMUNITY INFORMATION CENTERS(CICs) IN THE RURAL AREAS OF NEPAL:A PILOT PROJECT
Nepal Rural Information Technology Development Society (NRIDS) was established in 2004 with the objective of bringing IT awareness and services to people living in rural areas throughout Nepal. The fact that Nepal has failed to embrace the information revolution over the last ten years means that as a country we have fallen further behind the developed world, rather than gaining ground. Everyone would agree that Nepalese people who are involved in agriculture, education, construction, and tourism can benefit greatly from access to the Internet and web technologies, just as residents of other countries have. If only these people could have their eyes opened to how business and education is carried out in the developed world, business would prosper, and students would be benifitted. The problem is that much hard work is needed to provide computer access and training to rural areas in Nepal, and, as it stands, very little is being done to rectify the shortcomings in ICTs
This work began with the endorsement of the Syangja District Development Committee; the members of NRIDS have been formulating a blueprint to convert Syangja into the model district for an information revolution in Nepal. With the go of time this movement has been extended in Kaski and Dang District as well. The Members of NRIDS are working now for the formulation of Strategies throughout the Rural Nepal. This blueprint is based around the establishment of Community Information Centers (CICs) in villages where there is currently an extreme shortage of information and information processing mechanism. A CIC, with the involvement and support of local business people, teachers, serviceman, and young people, have been established in different villages; Mayatari, Karendada, Bagalthok, Lampata, Bayatari, and Helu in Syangja; Kaskikot, Dhital in Kaski and Rampur, Laxmipur of Dang district.
A CIC is a place where anyone can have access to the tools and services of the information society, and receive assistance in making use of them. These include but are not limited to Cyber Cafés, Information Kiosks and all Public Computer Access Points e.g. Public Libraries, Computer Colleges and Computer Laboratories for other Institutions of Learning. These are quickly becoming a tool for economic and social development in the world.
CIC is designed not for the big talks of ICT but to make the local people aware what ICT is. It is concerned with how the local people can get benefited from the ICT such as how can even a farmer get benefits from it. NRIDS is carrying its activities with belief that the one and only alternative that Nepal can compete in the today’s global world is through ICT.
It aims at providing the local community with an environment where the people can increase their skills, expertise and professionalism with the help of ICT in their respective field. The primary objective of NRIDS is to create ICT awareness in the grass root level. The major concern of NRIDS is to well acquaint the community in ICT development for the community, by the community and with the community.
Background:
Due to the geographical and topographical variation in Nepal, the remote areas have not been fully integrated into the reach of modern day technology for the rapid socio economic development and bringing it into the national mainstream. A vital need have been felt to adopt the modern ICT perspectives in the global context.
The basic motivation behind the development of this framework is to exhibit how the power of IT can be used for the betterment of the society. Establishment of the community centers (CICs) in different parts of the rural areas can aid in achievement of the major goals of the government for the overall development using the ICTs.
The survey conducted by NRIDS came up with the fact that there are teachers and students of the many rural communities who haven’t even seen Computer. In this current scenario, CICs can play a vital role in making people aware of the latest Technology.
Access to telephones and the Internet is very low in Nepal compared to most of other countries. Preliminary survey shows about two people out of 100 have access to a telephone and in less than one person out of 100 have access to the Internet facility. For those lucky few with access to information and communications, they use them to research products to get fair prices; for online government services to avoid long-travel distances in developed countries like US but still not in Nepal. Expanding access to communications technology for people, businesses and the government in Nepal will make a positive difference in people’s quality of life, strength of the economy and governments’ ability to govern effectively. To reach these goals, IT task force must invest in policy reform, private sector entrepreneurship, and people through innovative and development appropriate applications of information technology both on the urban as well as rural areas of Nepal.
Objectives:
Goal # 1 Rural Transformation through ICT
Little has changed in the villages of Nepal in the past decades. Yes, schools have been built, but many still lack teachers and appropriate teaching methods. There are phone lines in selective villages; getting a dial tone is still a challenge. Electricity supply is at best intermittent. Health care is still limited in its availability. Entertainment is limited to radio or television, if at all the electricity is there. Nepal's villages are dependent on agriculture for much of their sustenance. Natural calamities like landslides, floods or drought are common occurrence across Nepal. As a result, villagers, for the most part, remain a poor lot - the per capita income of Nepal's villages is perhaps much less than USD 200 per annum.
Most important, the opportunities available to the people in villages are not dramatically different from what they were many years ago. Villages in Nepal are where we live if we have no other option at all. And yet, Nepal is in its villages. Almost 80% of Nepalese live outside of the urban areas. Even as there is one Nepal which is racing ahead with optimism towards the future, there is another Nepal which seems to be stuck in the past. If Nepal has to progress, there is little doubt that Nepal's villages have to progress first.
Transforming Rural Nepal is a challenge that should focus to the best of Nepalese minds - it is perhaps the single biggest barrier to making Nepal a developed country. Nepal's villages need disruptive innovations to make the giant leap forward. While exploring the role that technology can play in transforming Rural Nepal, one can argue that what the poor need is food, water and energy, more than technology. It is an argument we have been making since a long time.
Nepal's solution so far has been myriad poverty alleviation programs and employment schemes. Corruption and insurgency of Maoists is not the only reason they have met with limited success. The question to ask is have they changed or enhanced people's skills, and exposed them to new world? To that, the answer is a resounding no! The time for incremental innovation is over. Nepal needs creative solutions to start a revolution which can take its villages fast forward in time - creating them economically viable units and growth engines, harnessing the power of the villagers, and opening up new horizons with the promise of a better tomorrow.
NRIDS is working on promoting ICTs in the rural sector for more than two years. Initially we have started in Syangja, a remote part of Nepal. There were a lot of comments associated with the DO’S and DON’T’S in the present context of instability of the country. However we just marched forward toward our mission. It was not easy to establish community information centers (CICs) in the rural areas of Nepal. Yet it was also challenging to gather a mass of people and share our knowledge with the people.
NRIDS members experienced a very tough time to make the government authority to convince about the work we were going to do. As the matter of fact they really didn’t know What ICT is? We are in a country where the senior level government staffs don’t know the most powerful and the foremost technology of twenty first century.
Its not that we remain pessimistic due to these kinds of situations, it’s not still too late to start! We must be Promoting ICT in Nepal from various walks of life. Mere conducting conferences and having the big talks of ICT is not only the need. The concerned authority should work with grass root level where there is actual need of the ICT.
Rural transformation will make the lives of rural people comfortable, secured, independent and respectful state. This impact of transformation will insure that the rural people are feeling better than the prevailing conditions. It is the most important matter which needs a lot of homework from each and every elements of the Community. The goal is not only about transforming a single community but the community through out the nation. So the government also needs to take this matter seriously for the achievement of this goal. NRIDS will strive for stimulating and awakening the rural public, government authorities and all the concerned bodies. NRIDS is currently working on Rural Transformation by establishing CICs in the remote villages. This initiative will surely help for the achievement of international and national goals such as Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) .Implementing this initiative is to make people look at things differently and in line with the technological advancement such that they gets their jobs done faster and easily. However, this is a slow and steady process. According to the NRIDS experience, this initiative is rather a kind of experience and share experience process. There are so many communities willing to establish CICs in their areas as a result of the transformation of the nearby communities by CICs practices. It is obvious that Rural transformation is the demand of time .So all the Concerned authorities and the general public should support this movement. NRIDS has priorities it’s Focus on the establishment of (CICs) in the Rural Areas of Nepal for the Rural Transformation.
3.2 Objective 1: Develop institutional and individual ICT capacity
The ICT sector is important for developing country like Nepal, but it is also a critical ingredient for growth of many, if not most, other sectors where the use of ICT has become a prerequisite for competitive operations and expansion. Not surprisingly, the gap between the haves and have-nots that exists in access to information and communication telchnology persists in the ICT sector itself. We should place a high priority on narrowing the gap. To do this, Nepal must develop an educated ICT-knowledgeable workforce as well as ICT private sector businesses able to compete locally, regionally and sometimes globally.
We should work together to have a multi-pronged approach to help rural and urban communities to build ICT sectors, working with both public and private sector partners. Areas of focus are:
Supporting innovative ICT workforce development opportunities for students, out-of-school youth and adults.
Increasing ICT knowledge for policy makers and government officials in order to understand the impact and implications of ICT in society
Building management and operational capacity of individual private sector firms in the ICT sector.
Supporting efforts to increase the regional and global competitiveness of the entire ICT sector or sub-sets of it (e.g., the software industry).
Fostering ICT sector business associations focusing on strengthening the industry.
3.3 Objective 2 - Demonstrate innovative ICT applications
IT Related organizations must be able to draw on community and international technological leadership and experience, Organizations should take a comparative advantage in assisting rural communities in applying ICT to develop challenges across all sectors.
ICT activities are extended in all the development programs including:
Agriculture
Tourism
Conflict Management
Democracy and Governance
Economic Growth
Education
Energy
Environment
Health
HIV/AIDS
Humanitarian Assistance
Natural Resources Management
Population and Reproductive Health
Poverty Reduction
Women in Development
3.4 Objective 3- Encouraging Policy Reform
In major cities, e-commerce transactions and Internet use are increasingly common, but they are not yet used in everyday business practices. Information and communications technologies (ICT) must be high quality and available to a large percentage of the population for them to be used successfully. IT task force must work with governments and businesses to reduce barriers to ICTs and allow global e-commerce to function openly and transparently.
3.5. Objective 4- Enabling Businesses to succeed
Ensuring businesses can do what they need to do to be successful means combining policy reform with the ability to provide universal and affordable ICT access to consumers. This includes training enough technicians to support the industry’s growth. NRIDS is in the process to establish Internet cafes in rural Nepal, to give people in remote areas access to a computer and the Internet when they need it. But the current situation is not allowing us to work at our best. We are still optimistic about the goal. In partnership with various organizations, NRIDS trains women and men, young and old,, giving them skills for good jobs and making sure the industry has well-trained professionals to support it.
3.6. Objective 5- Using ICT to Improve Approaches to Development
Internet and communication technologies can significantly improve the way NRIDS and other related organizations carry out their development programs, whether it is improving health and education, supporting democracy, increasing economic growth, and promoting the environment. Remote sensing technology, for example, improves the ability to map and monitor use of forests and other environmental resources. The Internet strengthens communications with projects and central offices, strengthening quality control and delivery of services. Increased use of these technologies in development itself is a critical part of building a foundation for expanding ICT use in rural Nepal.
Milestones:
7.1. First Phase Implementation of CIC
Services provided in the First phase
• Market information of agricultural products to the local people.
• Provides the basic functionalities of library and the meeting point of people for various discussions and decision making.
• Daily newspaper that is published is provided everyday in the center.
• Notice board will be kept for the people searching for products to be purchased or to be sold. So that they can use this board to disseminate information to the huge mass. Best examples practiced may be the notice of a farmer willing to sell a buffalo. He/she would just write the description of his buffalo and allocate the price with his contact address. The person willing to buy it can contact him/her.
• Wall newspaper will be published by the community students so that CIC can be computerized in its next phase.
• Data collection about the community will be carried out for publishing the Village profile which can aid in the Tourism sector of that community.
• For the sustainability, as an example, local people can submit their electricity bills in CIC, and later on it makes the payments to the electricity offices. It’s aiming at providing social services and income generating activities for the CICs.
7.2. Second Phase Implementation
The second phase implementation includes providing knowledge to the people about computers. This CIC concept is running on the link concept first information then Communication technology. The second phase will be implemented in the following way.
• There will be around 5-10 computers in each CICs .These computers will be connected to the internet. If no proper infrastructure is found in school then the possible alternatives will be searched such as Youth Club, Amma Group. Location of the CICs will be entirely based on the community decision. After all, CICs are for the community, by the community and with the Community.
• There will be two phone lines in each CIC one for the PCO and other for the Internet Connection.
• The main aim of CIC is the concept of “IT Chautari” where local people can get each and every details of the information required making it a model community information center (CIC).
• It will provide real time applications, Computer related documentaries and the entire information about all the necessary fields such as Agriculture etc.
• It will act as an inquiry system in a Community. Information on Health, Education and Industry will be comprised.
• All the Desktop work will be provided by CICs in fare prices to the community such as printing, Scanning etc.
• CIC will also serve as the computer training institute to train the local Community.
Server Computer
Figure: Second Phase Implementation
The CIC will facilitate not only the rural regions to take the benefits of internet connectivity but also bring the rural region closer to the national mainstream by enabling efficient and faster information flow amongst the people. The IT infrastructure set up at CIC will help the government to make the government services available through CIC.
• To conduct computer training programs.
• To explain the benefit of CIC and its applications.
• To provide access to socio economic databases.
• To provide internet and email services.
sassdasd
Fig: Overall Structure of Community Information Center
5.3. Third Phase Implementation: Internet based Community web-portal
Fig. Diagrammatic illustration of Internet based Community web-portal
CIC Portal working methodology
1. www.cic.com CCIC page: This is the Index page of CIC. In this page links of different Regions are kept. Search engine will be there in the index so that a user can easily find the required information about the particular CIC. In index page the important information and activities of different CICs all over the country will be presented. Administrator has full right to change and enter datas. Where normal user can use and see informative datas provided by the CICs. The registered member can also perform transactions with different CICs. A login and password is necessary for those registered members.
2. RCIC: This is the Regional CIC page. All the links regarding specific regional CICs will be set aside. In this page the important information and activities regarding that region will be presented. For easy search of information and desired information about CICs, search engine will be kept.
3. Zonal page: This is the Zonal CIC page of different zones. All links of that specific zone will be set aside. In this page the important information and activities regarding that zone will be presented. For easy search of information’s and CICs again Search engine will be kept.
4. District Pages: In district pages different information and activities regarding individual district will be presented as a quick reference. In this page different VDCs links will be provided.
5. VDC Pages: Information and activities of different VDCs will be reserved so that user can know about that village in a brief.
6. RCIC: This is the main page for a CIC working in rural sector. Developments, news, facilities, activities, necessities, problem etc. about that CIC will be present in this page. From this page a normal user can know all the information like price of fruits, vegetables, organic fertilizer etc. After knowing information if he is a registered member then he can sell or buy different goods as well. Normal users do not have all these privileges.
After the completion of the second phase, there will be the internet connection in every CIC as shown above. So a CIC portal (Website) will be made where all the CICs have their own space where they can update their information. Also any general user can look at the updates from any where around the world. For updating there will be username and password to be remembered. But for the general user he/she can simply click the required CIC link to get the information. Networking all the CICs physically is not a better option with regard to its high costs and the inefficiency due to the wide range covered. Also there will be a chat room in the website for the CIC members to communicate instantly. We can think the Chat room just as a Yahoo Messenger lets call it as CIC Chatbox.
CICs in every village are the starting point. These centers are not critically dependent on connectivity. They should be able to function well independently and offline. But as the options for connectivity grow, networking them together into a grid call it the Community web-portal is the next step. What the Community web-portal does is create a internet work of the CICs, allowing for near real-time communications between them. This opens up a range of activities and applications that have previously not been there.
The CIC enables communications between the village and the district (and beyond). The Community web-portal becomes the platform for inter-village communications. This is interesting because so far in Nepal, there has not been much interaction between villages because of the limited options involved. Typically, villagers have interacted with either only nearby villages or with the district, which is one-level up the hierarchy. The network connecting up the CICs now makes each village a peer, and equidistant in the electronic world.
Prior to the Web, we had hundreds over 50 years of experience with broadcast media, from printing presses to radio and TV. Prior to email, we had hundreds of years experience with personal media -- the telegraph, the telephone. But outside the internet, we had almost nothing that supported conversation among many people at once. Conference calling was the best it got -cumbersome, expensive, real-time only, and useless for large groups.
Consider the possible impact of interconnecting the villages into an Community web-portal: villagers can now share best practices with others across the districts or the country, they can benchmark themselves on a wide range of metrics and discuss ways by which they can improve, they can find out about opportunities elsewhere, they can create vertical communities of practice to share knowledge and innovations, and they can voice their opinions via community web-blogs. This is just the starting point. As people in the villages start using the network, they will come up on their own with the ideas on how to make it more effective and useful.
One set of institutions which need to be part of the Community web-portal are engineering colleges, which can play an important role in both developing software applications relevant for the rural segment, as well as providing technical support to nearby villages. By stimulating the creativity of the young human mind, we can create a win-win situation for students looking for interesting and practical projects to do in their final year of college, and the needs of the villages looking for technology talent to create content and software for the CICs and the Community web-portal.
On this idea, overlay technology with CICs connected as part of the Village Community web-portal, and we have an architecture that now fully integrates the village into the networked world, both physically and virtually.
By building a technology centre in the villages and connecting these together, we are leapfrogging a whole set of people from an era where they could interact with only a handful of people to one where they can peer with many more like them irrespective of distance. It is much like how the Internet connected diverse and isolated networks in its early days. The Community web-portal is the first step towards making the global village a reality.
Budget:
6.1 Projected Monthly Cash flows for a Small CIC
Projected Monthly Cash flows For A Small CIC
Description Income Expenses Profit Details
Telephone
Local Calls 1200 750 450 Based on 40 minutes of local calls per day
Mobile Calls 2250 938 1312 Based on 25 minutes of Mobile calls per day
STD Calls 2700 2250 450 Based on 15 minutes of STD calls per day
Monthly Connection 175 264 -89 Nepal Telecom monthly connection cost
(Profit from Telephone) 2123
Internet
Customer Internet Usage 9000 9000 Based on 5 people using the internet for one hour per day
Montly Connection 1100 -1100 NTC monthly unlimited internet usage rate
Telephone Costs
Connection 175 264 -89 Nepal Telecom monthly connection cost
Local Calls 4500 -4500 Based on 1 hour of 2 computers operation, and 3 hours of 1 one computer operating, per day.
(Profit from Internet) 3311
Other Operations
Training 1000 1000
Staff Wages 3500 -3500
Electricity 500 -500
Rent 2000 -2000
Newspaper Subscriptions 200 -200
Stationary 234 -234
PROJECTED PROFIT/LOSS 0
The projected minimum net profit for a small CIC is zero Rupees.
Projected Setup Costs For A Small CIC
Description Details
Phone line installation (2) 21160
Purchase of computers (2) 30000
Computer installation costs 1840 Networking cables and electrical safety
Purchase of tables (3) 4500
Purchase of chairs (3) 1500
Signboard 500
Expected Setup Costs 59500
The projected minimum setup cost for a small CIC is fifty-nine thousand and five hundred Rupees.
6.2 Projected Setup Costs for a big CIC
Projected Setup Costs for a big CIC
Quantity Item Cost Min/Max Minimum Cost Maximum Cost
Furnitures for Internet Cafe
Computer Chairs 8 500/600 4000 4800
Computer Tables 8 1500/2000 12000 16000
Staff Chair 1 500/600 500 600
Staff Desk 1 1500/2000 1500 2000
Simple Carpeting 1 2000/3000 2000 3000
Drinking Water Set 1 2500 2500 2500
Cupboard (Daraj) 2 3000/5000 6000 10000
Freight 1 1500/3000 1500 3000
Sub-total 30000 41900
Computer & Networking
Computers 8 15000/30000 120000 240000
Switch 1 1500/2500 1500 2500
Computer Cables 50 mtrs. 1500/2500 1500 2500
RJ 45+ Outlets 20 200 200 200
Technical Charge 1 5000/10000 5000 10000
Phone Installation 2 10580/15000 21160 30000
Fax+Photocopy+Scanner+Printer Machine 1 30000/40000 30000 40000
Freight 1 1500/3000 1500 3000
Sub-total 180860 328200
For CIC library
Tables 4 1500/2000 60000 80000
Chairs 13 500/600 6500 7800
Racks 3 1500/2000 4500 6000
Cupboard(Daraj) 1 4000/5000 4000 5000
Teaching Board 2 1500 3000 3000
Simple carpeting 1 2000/3000 2000 3000
Curtains and Matress N/A 1500 1500 3000
Drinking Water 1 2500 2500 2500
News Board 2 1500 3000 3000
Sub-total 91800 118100
Stationary N/A 5000 5000 5000
Sub-total 5000 5000
Human Resource
Initial Teacher Training N/A 2000/3000 24000 36000
Sub-total 24000 36000
Projected Total Setup Cost 301660 487300
In Words:
The minimum projected setup cost for a CIC is three lakhs one thousand six hundred and sixty Rupees.
The maximum projected setup cost for a CIC is four lakhs eighty-seven thousand and three hundred Rupees.
Projected Profit and Loss Statement for a CIC
Min/Max Per Month Minimum Per Year Maximum Per Year
Projected Revenue
Telephone 7800/14000 93600 168000
Internet Café 6000/10000 72000 120000
Photo Copy, Fax,Printer & Scanner 1000/3000 12000 36000
Tution and Training Classes 1000/4000 12000 48000
Projected Gross Profit 189600 372000
Projected Expenses
House Rent 2000 24000 24000
Electricity 500/2000 6000 24000
Staff Wages 3000/4000 36000 48000
Internet charge per yr. 1000/12500 12000 15000
Daily News Paper Subscription (2) 334 4000 4000
Monthly News Paper Subscription (2) 67 800 800
Telephone expenses 5500/11000 66000 132000
Telephone usage for internet 2200/5000 26400 60000
175200 307800
Projected Net Profit Per Year 14400 64200
In Words:
The estimated minimum net profit for a CIC is fourteen thousand and four hundred Rupees.
The estimated maximum net profit for a CIC is sixty-four thousand and two hundred Rupees.
We are planning to Establish 30 Community Information Centers (CICs) this Year. Ten more CICs in Syangja District, ten CICS in Kaski District and Ten CICs in Dang District. Also we are in need of the funding for giving continuity to the previously established CICs.
Set up cost for 30 Small CICs: 30*Rs.59500 =Rs. 17, 85,000 only
Set up cost for 30 big CICs: 30*Rs.3, 01,660= Rs.90, 49,800 only (Minimum)
Set up cost for 30 big CICs: 30*Rs.4, 87,300= Rs.1, 46, 79,000 only (Optimum)
Note: Set up Cost will be negligible if the concerned authority could provide the second hand Computers, Fax machine, Photocopy Machine, Scanners, Printers, and the furniture.
Needs:
Volunteers, Instructors, computers , Fax, Photo copy machine, Telephone sets and the stuffs needed to set up the CIC.
Contact Name: Sudip Aryal
Contact Email Address: sudiparyal@gmail.com
Contact Phone Number: 977-9841470726
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