Industry Acts Globally On Digital Divide
     Increasingly, private industry, acting alone or in partnerships with non-profit groups or governments, are taking the lead on stemming the global digital divide. IBM's partnership with Harvard provides a roadmap for developing countries to assess their technological capabilities—from how wired the nation's schools are to the country's trade policy. The guide, officially launched last week, also calls for increased partnerships between the government and private industry to solve the problem. And although the initiative doesn't stress any specific regulatory positions governments should take if they want to grow their economy, IBM's Caine says he tells governments that liberalizing their telecommunications sectors can become a major catalyst for change. In many developing countries, one telecommunications company, often owned by the government, dominates the market.
     "One of the most powerful and least expensive decisions is to liberalize their telecom policy," he said.
     The Bahamas' government is the charter member of the program, but Sachs said he is working closely with state governments in India and nations such as Venezuela, Peru, Equador and Bolivia to help them use technology. While Sachs acknowledges that many developing nations have more pressing problems, such as civil war or drought to deal with, he said governments don't have to choose between one or the other.
     "It's not a choice between computer literacy and urgent needs, it's a platform, on which urgent needs can be met," he said.
     Other companies also see the benefits of linking businesses and governments together to find ways countries can get ready for e-commerce. Bruce McConnell, former director of the International Y2K Cooperation Center, is heading a start-up, McConnell International. It encourages businesses and governments to work together on problems in the online world such as information security, improving a nation's infrastructure, opening markets and fostering government services online. Although the group of companies involved, called the i3forum (International Internet Information Forum), won't be formed until the middle of this summer, McConnell said he expects to have companies from all sectors, not just high-tech businesses, participating globally.
     "What companies are realizing is that they need to work in partnerships with these countries," he said.
     Apart from McConnell's plan, the old network of global Y2K coordinators who once banded together to make sure the world's computers would be safe for the millennium computer bug is reincarnating as an international network for Internet policy, operating under United Nations auspices. So far, more than 100 countries have joined the international network.

The Corporate Connection
     High-tech companies such as Microsoft, America Online, Cisco Systems and Hewlett-Packard are also helping countries develop technologically. Cisco Systems and the United Nations Development Program teamed up last summer to offer Netaid, a Web site and rock benefit concert created to help fight poverty and put public computers with Internet access in Third World villages. Part of the program's goal is to help local artisans find markets abroad.
     Cisco also operates a network of academies in 61 countries that train workers on ways to service and maintain computer networks. On Monday, Cisco signed an agreement with Egypt's government to provide networking equipment at two new academies opening in Cairo. Cisco also will advise the government on Egypt's $1 billion-plan to create a high-speed telecommunications network. Besides some good corporate public relations, these initiatives provide companies such as Cisco with a potentially valuable base of workers.
     "The people who graduate from these networking academies know how to work on the Internet," said Kent Jenkins, a Cisco spokesman.
     A Hewlett-Packard initiative has created 50 digital town centers in small Latin American communities that are wirelessly connected to the Internet and equipped with computers, printers, scanners and a satellite Internet link. The centers provide education, telemedicine and other communications services. American Online's European divisions are looking within their own countries to combat the digital divide. AOL Germany has focused on bringing school children on the Net, paying for students' Internet access costs, which can be quite expensive in Europe, for an hour each day. AOL U.K. is working with local charities to give the disabled Internet access.
     Within the United States, companies such as America Online, Motorola and Bell Atlantic participate in the United States Telecommunications Training Institute (USTTI), a joint effort between the government and business to teach telecommunications and broadcast training courses for people who manage communications infrastructures in developing countries. The program, which was founded in 1982, offers free yearly classes taught in-house by U.S. companies and government agencies.
     Another non-profit group is training people in developing countries to use technology so they can sell goods online, reaching a much bigger market than they could on their own. PEOPLink, which features handmade crafts such as woven baskets from India or pillows from Guatemala, teaches artisans how to use digital cameras to showcase their crafts online. PEOPLink then markets the crafts on its Web site to consumers in industrialized nations.
     Daniel Salcedo, who founded PEOPLink back in 1995, said while fighting the digital divide is a serious issue, it's about more than just providing the technical capabilities for developing countries.
     "What the world doesn't need is more bandwidth," Salcedo explains.
     Instead, he said governments and businesses that really want to help will assist developing countries to create their own local content and nurture their own e-commerce companies—not just provide Internet access so they can consume more from industrialized nations.
     While Salcedo said he believes the Internet could be a great equalizer, he warns that the world will become more unequal if developing countries can't take advantage of the Internet's potential the way other countries have. And this in turn will ultimately help everyone, he says.
     "You've got to have the people in the country able to buy something before you can sell them something," he said.
- by Caroline Broder