I think pkariuki has a point. The fact that even here in a University of Technology, students are encouraged to come up with creative solutions to problems affecting our current markets. However, the discouraging bit is that we tend to see recurring projects and very marginalized creativity. Certain societies and technology clubs do try to get innovative by going out there and identifying where they can offer solutions. Another weakness I find in our institutes of higher learning is the fact that research in IT is seriously lacking. If you are keen to observe, research is usually based on agriculture thus shutting out IT which we all know will propel this nation to achieving the vision 2030. My humble opinion is to venture into research and to ask stake-holders to come and tap into the brains here in campus. Having research carried out in campuses in as far as technology is concerned will even ensure the use of under-utilized resources and am referring to computers during after hours, idle bandwidth which will ultimately be paid for as if it were used, etc etc. Some bit of encouragement from the private sector that is coming up is the holding of competitions and exhibitions like the IEEE competitions which actually bring out the hidden potential in the students. This however, is also abit tricky because we have had cases of such stakeholders taking advantage of this thus benefiting themselves and short changing the students. I firmly believe in as far as developing add-on software to work with enterprise softwares like SAP or Oracle, this can be done locally and if the fear expressed here is the confidence in not having these developers going under with out a trace, then why not do it in university level where you have the full backing of its administration. Tyrus Muya Kamau. Systems Administrator, eLearning Jomo Kenyatta University of Agri & Techology Kenya, Cell Phone: +254-721292936. Mail:tyrus@icsit.jkuat.ac.ke [DISCLAIMER] This message may contain confidential information and must not be copied, disclosed or used by anybody other than the intended recipient. If you have received this message in error, please notify us by e-mail (noreply@jkuat.ac.ke) and then delete the e-mail and any copies of it. E-mail may be susceptible to data corruption, interception and unauthorised amendment, and no liability is accepted for any such corruption, interception or amendment, or the consequences thereof. No liability or responsibility is accepted for viruses - it is your responsibility to scan
Tyrus, The focus on agricultural research isn't wholly bad. As a matter of fact, I happened to be in a team that undertook a Joint ILO/ITU/UNECA study looking at the 'Impact of ICTs in Employment Creation and Poverty Reduction in Africa' with 8 pilot countries - Burkina Faso, Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda and Uganda. The conclusion was that ICTs have great potentials for both - if targeted in the right places. In Egypt, already people 'directly' employed in ICT is 200,000 (and about another 10x 'indirectly' employed). In Kenya, though accurate figures were hard to find, the estimate was 50,000, and in Ethiopia, the estimate was 49,000, etc. Two major viable application areas emerged: those with high-employment potential (notably agriculture and SMEs), and those with high-value addition potential (e.g. e-commerce - including e-banking, e-tourism, e-health, e-education). Of course this is not to say that more emphasis should not be put into ICT-research per se – just that twinned with demand drivenness, there is double benefit. As a matter of fact, we/ARCC are looking for good e-agriculture initiatives to partner with. JKUAT having initially been an agriculture & technology institute if some of your staff and/or research students are working in this area, let's talk off line. For those who might be interested in the Impact Study, I believe ITU and/or ECA will soon be publishing and availing publicly the report. For now, we’ll informally be sharing a preview of it at next month’s (Tuesday) KeKobi Monthly Seminars. Best rgrds, Shem Shem J. Ochuodho, MSc (EE), PhD (SoftEng), LLD (Hon) Chairman, African Regional Centre for Computing (ARCC-Kenya, Nairobi) and IGAD/EU Advisor on ICT Private Sector Development (Govt of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa) --- On Thu, 6/26/08, tyrus@icsit.jkuat.ac.ke <tyrus@icsit.jkuat.ac.ke> wrote: From: tyrus@icsit.jkuat.ac.ke <tyrus@icsit.jkuat.ac.ke> Subject: Re: [kictanet] Expensive software systems? To: "Shem Ochuodho" <shemochuodho@yahoo.com> Cc: "KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions" <kictanet@lists.kictanet.or.ke> Date: Thursday, June 26, 2008, 2:33 AM I think pkariuki has a point. The fact that even here in a University of Technology, students are encouraged to come up with creative solutions to problems affecting our current markets. However, the discouraging bit is that we tend to see recurring projects and very marginalized creativity. Certain societies and technology clubs do try to get innovative by going out there and identifying where they can offer solutions. Another weakness I find in our institutes of higher learning is the fact that research in IT is seriously lacking. If you are keen to observe, research is usually based on agriculture thus shutting out IT which we all know will propel this nation to achieving the vision 2030. My humble opinion is to venture into research and to ask stake-holders to come and tap into the brains here in campus. Having research carried out in campuses in as far as technology is concerned will even ensure the use of under-utilized resources and am referring to computers during after hours, idle bandwidth which will ultimately be paid for as if it were used, etc etc. Some bit of encouragement from the private sector that is coming up is the holding of competitions and exhibitions like the IEEE competitions which actually bring out the hidden potential in the students. This however, is also abit tricky because we have had cases of such stakeholders taking advantage of this thus benefiting themselves and short changing the students. I firmly believe in as far as developing add-on software to work with enterprise softwares like SAP or Oracle, this can be done locally and if the fear expressed here is the confidence in not having these developers going under with out a trace, then why not do it in university level where you have the full backing of its administration. Tyrus Muya Kamau. Systems Administrator, eLearning Jomo Kenyatta University of Agri & Techology Kenya, Cell Phone: +254-721292936. Mail:tyrus@icsit.jkuat.ac.ke [DISCLAIMER] This message may contain confidential information and must not be copied, disclosed or used by anybody other than the intended recipient. If you have received this message in error, please notify us by e-mail (noreply@jkuat.ac.ke) and then delete the e-mail and any copies of it. E-mail may be susceptible to data corruption, interception and unauthorised amendment, and no liability is accepted for any such corruption, interception or amendment, or the consequences thereof. No liability or responsibility is accepted for viruses - it is your responsibility to scan _______________________________________________ kictanet mailing list kictanet@lists.kictanet.or.ke http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/listinfo/kictanet This message was sent to: shemochuodho@yahoo.com Unsubscribe or change your options at http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/options/kictanet/shemochuodho%40yahoo.co...
participants (2)
-
Shem Ochuodho -
tyrus＠icsit.jkuat.ac.ke