In a clear indication that Government policies have thus far failed to bridge the so-called "digital divide," the report found that almost 40 percent of the Irish adult population are not interested in the Internet because they do not see it as being relevant to their everyday lives.
The Information Society Commission (ISC) has called on the Government to give specific priority to the rollout of a successor to the CAIT (Community Application of Information Technology) initiative, which operated between June 2001 and December 2002 with a budget in the region of EUR8 million and supported over 70 community-based projects throughout the country. The initiative was designed to address the digital divide by encouraging late adopters to engage with ICT in beneficial ways and by empowering communities to harness the benefits of new technologies to address issues of disadvantage and exclusion.
According to ISC member Inez Bailey, poor ICT skills could become a major problem for Ireland in the future. "Around half the Irish adult population do not currently have access to the Internet. But what is perhaps more worrying is that only 1 in 5 of these express an interest in having such access -- leaving over 1.2 million Irish adults who simply do not see a value or relevance in these technologies. Failure to address this problem today will mean poor ICT skills becoming the literacy problem of tomorrow."
The ISC has also called on the Government to ensure that ICT literacy is developed as a core focus of all Government-funded education and training programmes; to build community-based programmes to promote engagement with ICT among disadvantaged groups and individuals; to adopt imaginative ways of making ICT relevant through the e-government process; and to help community and voluntary groups to get relevant content on-line by rolling out an easy-to-use solution through the local government sector.
Quelle: ElectricNews
