Notes

Outline

Global Service Trust Fund – A Way to Help Bridge the Global Digital Divide Peter Knight,  Joseph Pelton,Francis Method, and Takeshi Utsumi

Overview of Presentation Objectives Measures Needed to Achieve Objectives Background and Rationale Finance and Organization Next Steps – Recommendations of the CITI Working Group – February 2000 A New Proposal developed at June 2000 international conference on “Saving Iridium”

General GSTF Coalition Objectives Expand educational opportunities and improve health in developing countries by enabling these countries to Make full use of electronic distance education and telemedicine Participate actively and fully in data-intensive and media-intensive exchanges with both developed countries and other developing countries Participate interactively and fully in joint research, professional development, and knowledge-building activities with institutions and organizations in other countries

Specific GSTF Objectives Make available sufficient broad bandwidth at free or highly reduced cost to enable a significant number of developing countries to undertake major new initiatives in distance learning and telemedicine.

Measures Needed to Achieve GSTF Objectives Reduce the cost of broadband connectivity to a level poor countries can afford. Create policy and regulatory frameworks conducive to the development of sustainable distance education and telemedicine programs. Establish high-quality applications in sufficient developing country sites to demonstrate technical feasibility, increase demand, and build support for more extensive use of such technologies in developing country contexts.

Background and Rationale The Internet, with its rapidly expanding and improving infrastructure, will be the main telecommunication media of tomorrow. The full potential for achieving revolutionary advances in education and healthcare in developing countries cannot be realized with the currently available information delivery infrastructure and at currently prevailing market prices.

Background and Rationale II Improved distance education requires much better ways of presenting information and of enabling learners to interact with facilitators to enable the learners to process that information into personal knowledge. What is needed is both high quality audio/video delivery and high quality interactivity. Developing countries need broadband Internet via international satellite and fiber-optic cable.

GSTF Finance and Organization A voluntary international e-rate for education and health Two separate contribution “funds” or “sources” would be established  an in-kind bandwidth transmission source a financial assistance source The Coalition: a broad coalition of commercial and governmental sources

Incentives for Contributors of Underused Transponders and Dark Fiber Money from the “money fund” will be used to purchase more bandwidth from the companies that donate free bandwidth.

Sources of Funding Overseas Development Assistance funds of OECD countries Cash contributions from the profits of international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the RDBs Cash contributions from foundations and companies Contributions in kind from companies owning underused satellite transponders and/or fiber optic cable (marginal cost near zero, builds future markets)

GSTF Policy Conditionality and Operational Policy GSTF allocations only to countries with “good” telecommunications, education, and health policies A participatory process to define “good”, with ITU, UNESCO, and WHO convening working groups including all key stakeholders World Bank to convene working group on GSTF operations – possible use of infoDev legal precedent for multidonor grantmaking organization

Allocation of GSTF Bandwidth and Cash The Fund’s bandwidth source might be allocated through a variety of means that might even include an auction process to organizers of distance education and telemedicine projects in qualifying countries. The cash source might be used for grants to fund access to bandwidth for such projects, with rules favoring poorer countries and end beneficiaries, assuring a certain geographical distribution of benefits between regions, and so forth.

Working Group Recommendations:Next Steps A more polished and developed draft of the proposal be put before major international conferences in 2000 An intensive effort be made to enlist the support of the leadership of the key international institutions Working groups on telecommunications policy conditionality, education policy conditionality, healthcare policy conditionality, and operational aspects of the Fund and the Coalition be convened respectively by ITU, UNESCO, WHO, and the World Bank.

See the CITI Founding Conference and the GSTF Proposal Objectives, photographs from the conference and full proposal knight-moore.com/projects/projectsindex.htm

A New Proposal CITI prepares a proposal to get seed money to convene workshops, prepare background materials Workshops would be held under the auspices of international organizations to establish policy conditions for GSTF funding But if international organizations don’t move, CITI could convene, inviting all key stakeholders to participate Summit Conference early in 2001, convoked by CITI and/or other organizations

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