Resumen de Building ICT Capacity to Reduce Poverty in the Northeast Of Thailand: Using ICTs to Support Eduation Macro-Policy

Devapoj Sambandaraksa, Rattanawan Rattakul

• The concept of eLearning has encompassed many diverse technologies. Distance learning is a traditionally accepted form of eLearning, yet it remains a one-way medium. The advent of the world-wide web and especially broadband has opened the door to many new concepts such as interactive and group learning. Yet, away from the public eye, these same technologies have also made possible an exciting new phase application of ICTs in learning that will be presented here. This paper will outline a current project of the Ministry of Information and Communication entitled “Market-based Mechanisms to Enhance Delivery of Skills and Services in Northeast Thailand”. This is a $420,000 USD project which aims to increase the ICT capacity of people in the Northeast of Thailand, one of the kingdom’s poorest regions, through enhancing skill delivery institutions through a series of productivity analysis, benchmarking, development of smartcard based systems for targeting delivery and services and capacity building. In this respect, eLearning is not so much about delivering knowledge to the end-user, but instead, it is about enhancing traditional skill-delivery mechanisms (colleges, universities) through ICT (benchmarking portals, statistical analysis and smartcard-based monitoring and tracking of their effectiveness). Training will be provided for policy-makers, educational institutions and employers for them to make the best use of the portal. If successful, the project will be scaled across the country and into Laos and Vietnam as part of the Thailand-LaosVietnam ICT Corridor project. The project was approved by the World Bank and the ASEM in-country committee in February, 2004.