17-06-2002 Focus on ICTs at the UN this Week
ICTs are high on the agenda this week at UN Headquarters in New York. Today and tomorrow, the UN General Assembly will hold a meeting on the digital divide in the context of globalization and the development process, and on synergies between ICT initiatives worldwide. On 19 June, Working Group 3 of the UN ICT Task Force ("Human Resource Development and Capacity Building"), including its UNESCO chaired Committee on "Enhancing Human Capacity Development and Knowledge Creation and Sharing " will also meet.
14-06-2002 Library of Sarajevo Functions Again, but Still Mourns Destruction of Historical Building
Almost ten years ago, in the night of 25 to 26 gunners occupying the hills surrounding Sarajevo destroyed August l992, the National and University Library of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In a recent report, Library Director Enes Kujundzic describes how the staff of the Library intensively worked to reconstructs collections and revive its functions in temporary premises, with assistance by UNESCO, the World Bank and the Government of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
13-06-2002 Afro@Digital, A Documentary on the Digital Revolution in Africa
- Despite the North-South gap, the information technology revolution has become a daily reality in many African countries, where the Internet, mobile telephones and digital video cameras are being used with extraordinary creativity and versatility. Afro@digital, a 52-minute documentary directed by Balufu Bakupa-Kanyinda of the Congo, and produced by UNESCO, looks at the promise ICT hold for Africa.
12-06-2002 Digital Information Poses Problems For Conservationists
An increasingly large share of the information produced today in practically all areas of human activity is compiled digitally and is designed to be accessed on computers. But this enormous trove of digital information may well be lost unless specific techniques and policies are developed to conserve it. UNESCO is presently examining these issues with a view to defining a standard to guide governments’ preservation endeavours in the digital age
UNESCO to Participate in International Market for Independent and Local Broadcasters
A package of 30 high-quality productions that reflect the world’s cultural diversity and local excellence in television-making will be presented by UNESCO at the International Market for Independent and Local Broadcasters (MITIL) that opens tomorrow inVevey (Switzerland). UNESCO, which encourages local TV production through its programmes, is also co-organizing with Eureka Audiovisual a training workshop on “Local and Regional Television: Programming, financial resources and content distribution” forMITIL participants.
10-06-2002 Advanced IT Training Courses Started in UNESCO/UNDP Project in Azerbaijan
- A training course in system administration for 10 fellows from Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan started last week at the “Regional Academy for Online Network Governance and System Administration” (RAONGSA) inBaku, Azerbaijan. The training, organized in partnership with the Baku Scientific and Training Centre and other regional donor organizations, comes under the UNDP/UNESCO project that led to the establishment of the Academy.
07-06-2002 UNESCO Hosts Launch of First On-Line Interactive Atlas of the Oceans
- The UN Atlas of the Oceans, described as the "most ambitious global scientific information collaboration ever online" was launched by representatives of UN agencies and leading international scientific organizations at a meeting of UNESCO's Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission in Paris on World Environment Day (June 5) this week. More than two years in development and after a decade of planning, the Oceans Atlas represents an international consensus-building tool expected to assist negotiationsof future marine-related agreements.
06-06-2002 Safeguarding the Documentary Heritage in Asia: UNESCO Meeting in Republic of Korea
- In Korea, where some 625 years ago movable metal types were used for the first time in history to print a book – the so called "Buljo jikji simche yojeol" (Jikji), a collection of essential texts of Zen Buddhism - a UNESCO sponsored workshop on the preservation of and access to the documentary heritage in Asia and the Pacific Region is taking place this week. The event, organized in the framework of UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme by the Korean National Commission for UNESCO and the City of Cheongju, brings together experts from ten countries in the region from 5 to 8 June 2002
03-06-2002 (Paris) UNESCO Guidelines on Distance Learning in Teacher Education Published
Distance learning can help to train millions of new teachers who are needed to achieve basic education for all by 2015. UNESCO's just published "Teacher Education Guidelines: Using Open and Distance Learning" provides guiding principles for planners in education ministries and teacher-training colleges about when and how distance education can be used successfully to expand and upgrade the skills of the teaching force.
31-05-2002 Africa's Civil Society: A Look at the Information Society
- The international processes of globalisation and liberalisation are not, as they unfold, working in favour of universal access to ICTs in Africa. This is one of the main findings of a meeting of representatives of African civil society, organized by UNESCO this week in Mali's Capital Bamako. The event that brought together the representatives of more than 25 organizations from 11 African countries was organized within the framework of the African regional Conference for the Preparation of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).
UNESCO Presents Community Multi-media Centre Methodology in Jamaica
- An interactive community multi-media centre to demonstrate how to combine computer, fax, Internet, email, photocopying and telephone with the traditional radio to inform, educate, access, repackage and store knowledge will be presented by the UNESCO Kingston Office at two events in Jamaica: the conference of the Association of Caribbean University Research and Institutional Libraries (ACURIL 2002) in Ochos Rios (May 27- June 1) and the Green Expo 2002 in Kingston (June 7 – June 9, 2002).
24-05-2002 Cover Environment, UNESCO Adviser Urges Pacific Journalists
- Radio journalists from around the Pacific met in Samoa this week to look at ways of promoting environment news in their home countries. The 13 mid-career journalists from throughout the Pacific Islands have spend a week at the South Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) training centre in Apia for a workshop on "Media and the Environment".
UNESCO European WSIS Pre-Conference to be Held in Germany
"Information Cultures and Information Interests: European Perspectives for the Information Society" is the title of the UNESCO Regional Pre-Conference for the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) that will be held, for the Europe Region, in Mainz, Germany, from Thursday, 27 June, to Saturday, 29 June 2002. 'Access to information' will be the cross-cutting dimension of the Conference.
22-05-2002 UNESCO Computer/Internet Centre Opened at Education Ministry in Kabul
- An Internet equipped computer training centre established within the Ministry of Education in Kabul was officially opened on Monday (20th May, 2002). The centre, put in place by UNESCO with funds from the Government of Japan, is equipped with 19 Compaq Pentium 4 computers and a Compaq Proliant server. It also includes overhead projection equipment for training purposes and a high-speed Internet connection. The centre is the first of its kind within any Ministry in Afghanistan.
22-05-2002 (Paris) UNESCO Launches Global Community Telecentre Resources Website
Facilitating networking among community telecentres worldwide, through the sharing of information, experiences and resources related to practical telecentre implementation and management is the objective of a website just launched by UNESCO. The new online service contains an annotated and classified inventory of resources of potential use to community telecentres, multimedia centres and other local information and informatics initiatives.
21-05-2002 16,000 Links Now on UNESCO’s Libraries and Archives Portals
- More than 16,000 links to websites of libraries and archives worldwide and to resources related to librarianship and records and archives management are listed on the UNESCO Libraries Portal and the UNESCO Archives Portal. Both portals were launched in 2001 in order to provide service to concerned professional communities worldwide.
21-05-2002 (Paris) UNESCO Calls for Release of Journalist U Win Tin from Jail
- In a letter to the Prime Minister of Myanmar (Burma), Senior General Than Shwe, UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura on Friday called for the release of 72-year-old journalist U Win Tin, laureate of the 2001 UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize, who has been in jail since July 1989.
16-05-2002 ITU Council Concludes: Preparation for World Summit on the Information Society and Plenipotentiary Conference at Centre of ITU Work Plan
The 10-day meeting of the ITU Council, the governing body of the International Telecommunication Union, concluded on Friday, 3 May. The work of the Council covered much ground, with a great deal of emphasis on two important ITU initiatives. These arethe World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), to be convened in Geneva in December 2003 and the Plenipotentiary Conference of ITU, held every four years. The Plenipotentiary; ITU’s top policy-making body, will be held in Marrakesh, Morocco from 23 September to 18 October 2002.
UNESCO Workshop on WSIS for African NGOs to be Held in Mali Next Week
- As the Executive Secretariat of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) is organizing its first regional Conference in Mali's capital Bamako, from 28 to 30 May 2002, UNESCO is holding a pre-conference workshop, also in Bamako, on 26 and 27 May to provide a platform for discussion for African professional NGOs and civil society regarding the inclusion of the African region in the emerging Information Society.
15-05-2002 Committee on Human Capacity Development of UN ICT Task Force Meets in Paris
- UNESCO hosts today the first meeting of the Committee on “Enhancing human capacity development, knowledge creation and sharing” of Working Group 3 of the UN ICT Task Force. The Committee that is chaired by Abdul Waheed Khan, UNESCO's Assistant Director for Communication and Information, will discuss plans to enable more people to benefit from ICTs, via training, education and national capacity building.
14-05-2002 (Apia) UNESCO Publishes Training Course "IT for Decision Makers" on CD-ROM
- A training course on "IT for Pacific Island Decision Makers" is now available on CD ROM. Designed by Taholo Kami for the UNESCO Apia Office, the course which will soon also be online at WebWorld, is an attempt to introduce some consistency in approaches to ICT workshops in the Pacific by providing a basic set of modules that can educate and inform non technical people on the importance of ICTs for national development.
13-05-2002 UNESCO/RINAF Organized Workshop on Distance Education in Africa
- An African Regional Workshop on "Distance Education National Policy and the Role of ICT: Design, Building, Implementation and Management" was recently organised by the Regional Informatics Network for Africa (RINAF) at the UNESCO Regional Office for Education in Africa in Dakar (Senegal). The Workshop on 2 and 3 May focused on the design, building, implementation and management of national policies in distance education focusing on ICTs in higher education.
Afghanistan Television Receives International Programmes Package
- UNESCO's global CreaTV television initiative has made available 102 quality television programmes to Radio-Television Afghanistan.
06-05-2002 UNESCO Director-General Launches Australia’s National “Memory of the World” Register
- UNESCO’s “Memory of the World” Programme was in the spotlights in Canberra today when UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura launched Australia's national register of heritage documents. Australia will thus have the distinction of hosting the first register at the national level to be developed under the global Memory of the World Programme, which now embraces over 40 countries.
04-05-2002 Press Freedom to Remain Focus of Caribbean Media
Media owners and practitioners meeting last month in the Antigua and Barbudan capital under the umbrella of the Caribbean Media Conference have established a mechanism to promote the interests of the media industries across the region and implement conference decisions.
UNESCO's IPDC Reforms Its Working Methods
The Intergovernmental Council of the International Programme for the Development of Communication (IPDC) of UNESCO held its twenty-second session from 10 to 12 April 2002 at the Organization’s headquarters in Paris. The session focused essentially on a set of reforms to the Programme’s working methods.
Argentinean and Peruvian Radios Receive 2001 IPDC-UNESCO Rural Communication Prize Award
The Bureau of the Intergovernmental Council of the International Programme for the Development of Communication (IPDC) of UNESCO awarded its 2001 Prize for rural communication to two Latin American projects. The Maestro Pablo Pizzurno school was rewarded for its Huanacache radio network that brings together all the schools and communities in the northern part of the Argentinean province of Mendoza, ninety per cent of which lies in the Lavalle desert created by the gradual disappearance of the forest.
03-05-2002 Kabul Launches World Press Freedom Day
“With the help of UNESCO through our publications, we are developing women and encouraging women to develop their daughters by sending them to school”. The words of Najiba Muram, Deputy Editor of the “Seerat Weekly”, the first women’s newspaper published after the fall of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. Mrs. Muram was speaking during an international satellite link between media professionals in Kabul and Washington, DC, USA. The interactive link was to help mark World Press Freedom Day (3rd May).
02-05-2002 European Youth Directory on CD-ROM Now Published
- A new Directory of youth structures in more than 30 European countries has now been published on CD ROM by the French Institut national de la Jeunesse et de l''éducation populaire (INJEP) within the framework of UNESCO's INFOYOUTH programme. The bilingual (English/French) directory, the first of a series of five, is a user-friendly tool designed to enable youth work professionals from throughout the world to acquire a greater understanding and knowledge of European youth policies and practices.
30-04-2002 (Paris) UNESCO/OneWorld International Launch Training Video on Radio-browsing Techniques
A video training module on radio-browsing technique, produced by UNESCO and OneWorld International, is now available on UNESCO's community multimedia centre webpage. The video training module is intended to develop the skills of community radio and local FM radio presenters in developing countries.
