District information officers build capacity (Thursday, April 18, 2013, pg 3)

A training programme aimed at building the capacity of district information officers and community information center (CIC) managers on digital content development has ended in Accra.

The three- day event was to empower the participants to acquire work development skills expected to enhance their knowledge in digital local content management.

Organised by the Ghana Investment Fund for Electronic Communications (GIFEC) the program was attended by participants from 20 districts in the country.

Forty people benefited from a similar training programme in 2012.

Addressing the participants, the Administrator/ Chief Executive Officer of GIFEC, Mr. Kofi Attor said the concept of the CICs had gone beyond teaching people basic computer skills.

“The CICs needs to be relevant to the needs of the community. They should be a one-stop information center for the community,” he said

In that regard, he urged the participants to develop innovative ways to pass on information concerning pricing to farmers in their community to prevent the farmers from being ripped off by middlemen.

While pledging the commitment of GIFEC to ensure that the centres were well resourced to handle the needs of the communities, he urged the participants to ensure a good mantaince culture and make themselves relevant to the needs of the community.

The CICs are hybrid for-profit tele-center and nonprofit community resource center and their vision is to ensure universal access to Information and Communication Technology (ICT) applications for accelerated growth and development.

Currently, there are 137 CICs across the country with 97 fully functioning. Twenty more are on the drawing board for the year.

The GIFEC director of CICs Mrs. Victory Dei- Kuma said an assessment of the programme indicated that past beneficiary were making a lot of impact in their communities.

She said the fund would continue to monitor the progress of the participants to ensure that the knowledge they acquire was used to the benefit of their districts.

Some of the participants told the Daily Graphic that the programme would go a long way to help create an information base for the people in their district.

They urged GIFEC to organise more of such programme to help participants develop the needed skills that their work needed.

The CEO of the Information Technology Enabled Service (ITES) secretaries, Mr. Alhassan Umar, observed that it was not everybody who could get government jobs.

He, therefore, urged the youth to take advantage offered by ICT.

“It is not enough just to know how to surf the internet, you can create jobs for yourselves and others,” he added

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Need an Auto Loan? Monday, April 2, 2012, pg 20

KOJO  wakes up at 3 a.m. everyday to avoid being caught up in the long queue at the lorry park and he wished this could be over soon. Ama is always late for work. Her excuse? Besides having to take care of her family’s needs every morning, she lives too far away from her work place and its hellish getting a car to the office. Michael has tons of bills to pay monthly, yet he is tired of boarding trotros and taxis to the office.. He has lost several important documents and even money on some occasions in the unreliable public transport. In all the above scenarios, the characters will certainly welcome their own cars; if they can afford one. But what if the costs of the cars are beyond them?  Well! That is why the banks and other financial institutions are available to help. But it is not that simple. As the demand for cars increase, some banks have developed loans mainly for the purchase of cars. So bingo! Auto loans are the answer. But who qualifies for an auto loan? Everyone who h
Read more

Spiritual healers, men of God take over billboards, Monday, September 17, 2012, pg 32

Image
SPIRITUAL healers have virtually taken over space of billboards across the country. This new trend is gradually overshadowing billboards of businesses, which used to be their preserve. From domineering larger-than-life structures through to miniature signposts, the traditional priests and priestesses, mallams and other traditional healers are competing for space with churches and the business community. Billboards advertising churches and shrines are on the increase along highways across the country, sometimes obstructing pedestrians and motorists alike. Advertisers Association of Ghana (AAG) figures estimate the minimum cost of producing a billboard at GH¢3,000 while the most priced is GH¢80,000. Proof that religion is a booming business in Ghana can be found in the increasing number of signposts and billboards advertising temples, churches and shrines promising career success, wealth, status in society, good marriages and problem-free visa acquisition, as well as booming b
Read more