17-11-2003 UNESCO Events at WSIS Promote Knowledge Societies
"Towards Knowledge Societies" is the message that UNESCO conveys to the World Summit on the Information Society, in December, in Geneva trough a variety of events including a High Level Symposium and thematic round table discussions in the area of education, sciences, culture and communication.
14-11-2003 America-Indigena.Org to be Launched Today in Lima
America-Indigena.Org, a portal dedicated to indigenous peoples of the Americas, will be launched today in Peru's capital Lima. The portal that is supported by UNESCO and Alfa-Redi aims at fostering the identity of indigenous American communities promoting their cultural expressions and safeguarding their heritage.
13-11-2003 (Paris) Women Media Professionals Explore HIV/AIDS from a Scientific Perspective
The use of ICTs to improve reporting on HIV/AIDS in Asia was the main focus of a workshop that concluded yesterday in Chennai, India. This week-long meeting coincided with the 4th International Conference on AIDS in India and brought together 18 women media professionals from Bangladesh, India, Mongolia, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea and Sri Lanka.
First Caribbean Audio Visual Information Conference. A Breakthrough for the Region
Over one hundred participants from thirty-two countries shared skills and knowledge about audiovisual archiving at the first Caribbean Audio Visual Information Conference that took place from 4 to 9 November in Kingston, Jamaica under the theme “Audiovisual Archiving: Our National Heritage and History”.
10-11-2003 (Paris) Information-based Society and Knowledge on Agenda of World Science Forum
"Information-based society and knowledge" is one of the items of the agenda of the first World Science Forum in Budapest (Hungary) that ends today in Budapest. Organized by UNESCO and the International Council for Science (ICSU), in partnership with the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, the event review developments since the first World Conference on Science, held in Budapest in 1999.
07-11-2003 Governments are Installing the Internet, but not Using it Much - UN Study
About 91 per cent of Member States are installing and using Internet services, but "online government" has raised questions of cost-effectiveness in developed and developing countries, according to a United Nations study released earlier this week.
06-11-2003 Libraries Are at the Heart of the Information Society, IFLA Says
"Libraries and librarians can and should have a key role in helping to deliver an equitable global information society" This is the core message of the delegates from over 70 countries attending the Pre-Conference to the World Summit on the Information Society that was organized by the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) in Geneva earlier this week.
05-11-2003 Great Interest in UNESCO Paper Conservation Workshop in Lima
A Workshop on the conservation of archives and library materials will be held at the National School of Archives Jr. Manuel Cuadros, located at the Palace of Justice in Lima, Peru, from 10 to 14 November, 2003. Already now more than 50 conservators from archives and libraries from 10 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean have registered.
04-11-2003 (Bangkok) Beijing Workshop Develops Guidelines on Teacher Training in ICT Integration
Bringing together Asia-Pacific's leading experts in technology-enhanced teacher training, UNESCO Bangkok recently held a workshop on "Development of Guidelines on Teacher Training in ICT Integration and Standards for Competency" that was held from 27 to 29 September 2003 in Beijing, China.
03-11-2003 International Forum on Local Cultural Expression and Communication
An International Forum on Local Cultural Expression and Communication, organized by UNESCO, starts today in Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic). It will address issues such as safeguarding endangered cultures through communication, producing local content as an expression of cultural diversity as well as promoting communication policies with an emphasis on cultural diversity, freedom of expression and local content.
31-10-2003 ICT Training Seminar for Youth Ends in Georgia
Today marks the closing of the sub-regional training seminar: "Information Technologies for Youth of the Caucasus Region" held 28-31 October 2003 at the Tbilisi Orbeliani State University. The seminar has been jointly organized within the Framework of Cooperation between UNESCO's INFOYOUTH Programme and the Georgian National Commission for UNESCO.
30-10-2003 UNESCO Deplores Situation of Zimbabwe's Daily News
UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura today expressed his concern over the situation of Zimbabwe's Daily News, and deplored the arrest of its directors. “I am deeply concerned about the situation of The Daily News,” said the Director-General. "The constant charges and arrests of directors and journalists, as well as the administrative interference of the country's only independent daily, appear to be aimed at closing it down for good."
30-10-2003 Pacific Cultural Heritage Materials: Survey of Documentary Collections Now Online
The needs of libraries and archives to preserve their collections related to the Pacific and to make them accessible through digitisation are discussed in a study entitled "Pacific Cultural Heritage Materials: A Desk Survey of Print & Documentary Collections" by Sin Joan Yee of the Library of the University of the South Pacific in in Suva, Fiji, that is now online available.
29-10-2003 (Paris) Media Training: Impact in the Workplace
How much impact can a one-week workshop have on the way journalists cover HIV/AIDS? UNESCO wanted to assess the impact of its first workshop for women media professionals on the use of ICTs to report on the science of HIV/AIDS, held last April in Kampala, Uganda. Co-organiser SciDevNet (the Science and Development Network) sent a questionnaire to all 17 participants five months later . . .
28-10-2003 Linking Traditional and New Media: UNESCO Supported Training Kit Now Available
A multimedia training kit to support linkages between ICT and more traditional media such as radio and television for development through a structured set of materials is now available on the website of ItrainOnline, a joint initiative of six organizations with expertise in computer and Internet training in the South.
27-10-2003 UNESCO Project Elaborates Methodology To Asses ICT Impact On Poverty Eradication
A research handbook to assess the potential role of ICT in poverty reduction is now available as a UNESCO project publication. The handbook, entitled "Ethnographic Action Research" was produced through the experiences of nine project sites established by UNESCO in South Asia (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka) under the project "Putting ICTs in the Hands of the Poor".
24-10-2003 Towards an Information Literate Society
Inequities among nations and individuals in today’s Information Society were targeted at a historic, first-of-its-kind meeting that was recently organized in Prague, Czech Republic, Forty participants from 23 different countries, representing all seven major geographic regions of the world, met to discuss Information Literacy.
23-10-2003 ICTs for Development: Towards a Connected Pacific
"Most Pacific Island Governments will still face the huge task to providing digital connections to their often scattered and remote populations, but evolving radio-based technologies provide new options that could help speed up this task." says Laurence Zwimpfer, Member of the Intergovernmental Council of UNESCO's Information for All Programme in an article for Future Times that is now also available as a new WebWorld Point of View.
22-10-2003 UNESCO Deplores Killing of Journalist Jean Helene in Côte d’Ivoire
UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura today deplored the killing of Radio France Internationale (RFI) reporter Jean Hélène in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire yesterday.
22-10-2003 UNESCO Condemns Assassination of Journalist in Cambodia
Koïchiro Matsuura, the Director–General of UNESCO, today condemned the assassination of Chuor Chetharith, a journalist of the Cambodian opposition radio station Ta Prum, in Phnom Penh on October 18 and called for action to track and prosecute those responsible for his killing.
22-10-2003 From Information Society to Knowledge Societies
Technological measures alone will not be enough to bridge the digital divide. The social, political and cultural aspects of the information revolution must also be tackled, if people in North and South are to reap its benefits fully. The latest number of the UNESCO Courier (October 2003, No.3) features an article on this issue.
21-10-2003 (Paris) UNESCO Supports News Exchange Network in South East Europe
UNESCO continues its support of "ERNO", a regional TV news exchange network serving public broadcasters in South East Europe that is also sponsored by the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Members of the network that is coordinated in Sarajevo send and receive, via Eurovision satellite, news items and pictures every weekday.
20-10-2003 Cyberspace Recommendation and E-Heritage Charter adopted by UNESCO's Member States
Two standard-setting instruments concerning information and communication technology have been adopted by UNESCO’s Member States during the 32nd session of the Organization’s General Conference that ended last Friday: one on multilingualism in cyberspace and access to the internet and the other on the preservation of digital heritage.
17-10-2003 (Paris) Friends of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina Met in Alexandria
The Sixth Meeting of the International “Friends” of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina took place, from 10 to 13 October in Alexandria, Egypt. This was the first formal meeting of the various “Friends” Associations since the Bibliotheca Alexandrina was officially inaugurated on 16 October 2002.
16-10-2003 New Director of UNESCO's Communication Development Division Takes Office
Wijayananda Jayaweera of Sri Lanka has taken office as the new Director of UNESCO's Communication Development Division. After Mogens Schmidt, recently nominated as Director of Organization's Division of Freedom of Expression, Democracy and Peace, and Elizabeth Longworth, freshly appointed Director of the Information Society Division, the new management team of UNESCO's Communication and Information Sector led by Abdul Waheed Khan is now complete.
15-10-2003 UNESCO Condemns Assassination of Russian Journalist Alexei Sidorov
UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura today condemned the assassination of journalist Alexei Sidorov, editor in chief of the independent newspaper Togliattinskoe Obozrenie (“Togliatti Review”), in the Volga region of central Russia on October 9.
15-10-2003 (Moscow) Retraining School Educators in Application of ICT in Education
"Retraining of School Educators in the Application of ICT in Education" is the title of a training seminar for teachers and teacher trainers that the UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education (IITE) is organizing in Baku, Azerbaijan from 20 to 26 October 2003.
14-10-2003 Access to Information Essential to the Establishment of Knowledge Societies
Meeting in Paris in preparation of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS, Geneva, December 10–12 and Tunis 2005), ministers from all over the world have agreed on a set of principles - including universal access to information and press freedom – that must guide the utilization of ICT to maximize its effectiveness for individual, community and national development.
14-10-2003 (Paris) New Technologies in Education: Mirage or Miracle?
"Whilst expecting any single technology magically to transform education is a chimera, we should not despair of the general potential of technology to improve education" says John Daniel, UNESCO's Assistant Director-General for Education in the Editorial of the October issues of UNESCO's education newsletter Education Today.
13-10-2003 (Bangkok) New Project on ICT Use in Technical and Vocational Education
Teacher trainers and curriculum developers in Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Myanmar, Nepal and Viet Nam will benefit from a project to improve management and delivery of Technical and Vocational Education (TVE) through the use of ICT. Funded by Japan, the project is being implemented by the UNESCO Office in Bangkok.
