Asian Telecentre Forum 2009 : eAsia 2009

For a growing number of people in the Asian region, the telecentre has become an important tool for communication and sharing of information and knowledge. The telecentres are being promoted as an answer to the problems of the digital divide as there are still large sections of society that do not enjoy access to ICTs and are therefore at risk of being excluded from the socio-economic benefits that such access brings. Telecentres have been springing up across developing Asia.

In the past six years, the Asian telecentre movement has gained tremendous momentum and a national advocacy campaign in India triggered under the auspices of the National Alliance for Mission 2007 launched by Prof M S Swaminathan, created a ripple effect not only by the stakeholders but also by the different National Governments, extending the idea of national level upscaling to Bangladesh, Nepal, Philippines, Sri Lanka, etc. It is estimated that more than 60 percent of the world’s telecentres will be in the Asian region. There has been a great amount of enthusiasm and new hopes among the emerging Telecentre networks in the Asian region, especially, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and other East and South East Asian Countries.

The Asian Telecentre Forum, fourth in the series of Telecentre forums will focus on the knowledge sharing and Telecentres 2.0 among the new and emerging Telecentre networks in the region. The forum will also provide a platform for deliberating on the key issues facing the Asian Telecentre movement and the way ahead. Experts will be engaged in close assessment of issues relating to project monitoring steered by external financial support, from international development agencies and governments in Asia.

Key Themes

• Sharing of experiences of national Telecentre movements
• Capacity building of Telecentres operators and managers with special reference to Telecentre.org Academies
• Global and National Curricular for different categories of Certifications
• Sustainability and Business models for Telecentres
• Government regulations, Legislatures and National Policy issues for Telecentres
• Telecentre 2.0
• Challenges and Opportunities for Telecenters with the proliferation of Mobile technologies
• Community Radio and Telecentres including experiences of IP radio
• BPO and Telecentres
• Content, Services, Localisation and Connectivity
• Future directions of Regional Telecentre networks and specially of Asia Pacific Telecentre Network
• Grass root innovations
• Web 2.0 and Telcentres
• Future of Web x.0 and how it affects Telecentres worldwide
• New technologies for last mile connectivity
• Cyber Security and Telecentres