The Rwanda cabinet adopted the National Information and Communication Infrastructure (NICI) Policy and Plan in 2000.
Moses Bayingana Director Private Sector, Education and Community Programmes said the policy is in line with the government's vision 2020. To facilitate the implementation of the national and sector ICT programmes outlined in the NICI Policy and Plan, the Rwanda Information Technology Authority (RITA) was established as a state agency.
The current thrust areas of NICI are human capacity development, infrastructure, e-government, ICT in education, community access and private sector facilitation.
"Currently we are reviewing what has been achieved under NICI 2000 in order to prepare the NICI policy 2010.
Along the preparation of NICI 2010, there is preparation of a resource mobilisation document, which is supposed to enable us mobilise funds to implement the policy. NICI 2005 was mainly to prepare a good environment to enable easy adoption of ICTs in different sectors," Bayingana said.
According to Bayingana, the NICI policy 2010 will start next year and among other activities will highlight mainly the e-government component. This component entails areas of government to citizens, government to government and government to business. Under government -citizens, emphasis is on enabling people have easy access to information and to enhance efficiency in government services as well as easier and faster access to services.
The government-to-government component aims at improving productivity and efficiency within government.
Government to business aims to enable business community access information easily. All this will be done using ICT as the enabling tool.
Human resource management is one of the core areas where the nation's strategic goal is to develop and harness the nation's human resources to initiate, support and maintain Rwanda's socio-economic development towards an information and knowledge economy.
"Today, technology and ICT departments enrollment by public and private institutions of higher learning has risen from 1,318 in 2000-2001 to 3,768 in 2003-2004. Other initiatives such as the introduction of the training programme for technicians and the establishment of the regional ICT Training Centre at KIST have contributed to the human resource development core strategy. A total of 690 technicians and 190 secondary school teachers have been trained under the two programmes," Information at RITA states in part.
Under infrastructure, another area of thrust under NICI, the inalienable issue is that of universal access.
As part of the strategy and commitment to increase access to telecommunications facilities, Rwanda is committed to liberalising the telecommunications and communications sector to encourage investment and competition in the sector.
"Initiatives to liberalise both sectors are evident. Rwandatel has been liberaslised and the radio communications sector has also been liberalised. The liberalisation has brought a number of private radio stations in the sector," he explains.
Radio is the most widely used method of communication in Rwanda. Some provinces have also inaugurated community radios to serve their populace.
Telephones have increased eight times in the last six years both GSM and fixed lines.
Under the rural telephony more than 250 VSATS have been deployed countrywide and over 1000 community phones have been installed.
To ensure universal access, telecenters have been established across the country and plans are underway to establish more centres.
Absorption of ICTS: E-government.
An e-government project document has been prepared outlining the short to medium and long-term scope of programmes envisioned.
The former is confined to applications that enhance capabilities and information dissemination while the latter will consolidate government services by constructing systems that will eliminate duplicative processes, enhance interoperability, reduce redundancy, foster integrity and provide measurable improvement in performance.
As part of efforts to modernise the civil and public services to facilitate administrative cost reduction and promotion of efficiency in government services delivery, there have been continued deployment and exploitation of ICTs to support the operations and activities of government services.
The current status indicates that nearly all ministries have Internet access and local area networks. A number of ministries have websites and wide area networks. There is also considerable increment on equipment and applications usage.
Under the education sector, deployment and exploitation of ICTs in the educational system and establishment of ICT specialist institutions are key to the absorption of ICTs in the sector.
The current computer/students ratios in the three public institutions of higher learning (National University of Rwanda, Kigali Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) and Kigali Institute of Education (KIE) are 1:12, 1:10 and 1:10 respectively.
Efforts to absorb ICTs in the educational sector have been initiated by the ministry of Education through the following projects:
- The School Net project with a mandate to provide computers and Internet connection to 20 secondary schools and train teachers and students in basic computer literacy skills and to create Internet access for schools.
- Distance learning project. Under this project, distance-learning centres have been established in all provinces.
- Rwanda Development Gateway Group: The project has led to the establishment of the Regional ICT Training Centre hosted by KIST as an ICT specialist institution. The geographical information system and the Rwanda development gateway projects hosted by the National University of Rwanda are also part of the group.
Banking Sector
Within the financial systems, the banking system in Rwanda has witnessed considerable computerisation progress. Interconnection at branch levels is evident. Currently there is ongoing implementation of the electronic card payment system by Simtel.
Health
In order to improve care for people living with HIV/AIDS, TRACnet, a MINISANTE project enables their databases to be accessed by health workers in the field using a phone and web-based application.
The successful operation, which was performed at King Faycal Hospital in collaboration with doctors in Belgium, is part of further efforts to absorb ICTs in this sector.
Despite the achievements, several challenges remain. The recruitment and retention of top level ICT professionals in government is critical to the success of the NICI plan. The primary impetus for growth in ICT has to come from private enterprise and community.
Development of innovative public-private sector partnerships remains a challenge.
Constraints faced include the current energy problem and lack of general awareness on the critical role of ICT as a strategic sector.
Telecom is still the biggest sector in communications. The rollout rate is high, some operators have rolled out 70% of the country.
"These are policies government is undertaking to bring about competition. With liberalisation the roll-out will hit 100%," Bayingana hopes.
Quelle: AllAfrika, 01.06.2005
