Several major investment projects that will extend the benefits of Latin America's nascent information infrastructure to less advantaged populations were announced at September's Informatics 2000 Conference.
The IDB and Worldtel, Ltd., a company that structures and funds telecommunications projects in emerging markets, said they will work with the Red Científica Peruana to develop 1,000 community information service centers in a deal valued at $125 million (see article "Internet for the people" in this issue).
The conference also featured announcements by the private sector financial sponsors of the Informatics 2000 Initiative, which include Microsoft Corp., Hewlett Packard Co., Oracle Corp., Sun Microsystems, Inc., Cisco Systems, Inc., Intel Corp., Lucent Technologies and AmeriSpace, a subsidiary of WorldSpace, Inc. These companies announced the formation of a consortium to develop a satellite-based network to provide low-cost multi-media programming and electronic mail to selected schools in five Latin American countries, in cooperation with local companies and universities.
Attended by more than 500 leading figures in government and industry from the region, Europe and Japan, the conference featured workshops on the impact of the information revolution on education, agriculture, health, public administration, the state and civil society. Panelists also discussed reports by ten task forces established earlier this year to study the role of information technology in specific sectors.
Based on the recommendations of conference task forces, the IDB is preparing a number of projects for funding, according to Warren Buhler, coordinator of the IDB's Informatics 2000 Initiative. The projects, several of which are region-wide in nature, will involve the public and private sectors with support from specialists from around the world, according to Buhler.
The task force reports are also being used to shape a Bank strategy paper to guide IDB lending and technical support in this area in the years ahead.