Checkpoint 7: language and content

Is the content transmitted by the ICT project relevant to the audience?

• The lack of availability of content in the local language can be a key barrier to the effective use of ICT for development.
• Where there is relevant information in a local language, it may still need to be tailored for use at the village level.
• Local research involving direct engagement with the local population is often needed to work out what is relevant information.
• Two-way communication needs also to be incorporated into the project to ensure that genuine understanding can take place and is demonstrated.

See examples of appropriate language and content:

• TARAhaat an Internet portal serving rural India
  TARAhaat is an Internet portal supporting a network of franchised village Internet centres in rural India. It delivers a wide range of social and economic information, as well as educational and other services, earning revenues through fee for service, membership fees, and commissions. The locally-relevant content-from market prices to marriage opportunities to educational material-is what drives the model at the village level.
• The project has been designed using extensive market research and socio-economic surveys, including a house-to-house survey of selected villages in the region. For more details, visit http://www.digitalpartners.org/tara.html.
• Stimulating local digital health content in Ghana
  Working with local communities in rural Ghana, this research project is testing ways to help the 'push' for local content by building community capacities to create and distribute local knowledge on mother and child health in a digital format. For more details, visit http://www.iicd.org/projects/.

• Published: Jan 2004
• Source: Curtain Consulting (http:// www.curtain-consulting.net.au)
• The above links take you to an external site - see our disclaimer.