THE INFORMATION CLEARING HOUSE COMMUNICATION 
INFRASTRUCTURE TAKES SHAPE

By Mawutodzi K. Abissath

Saturday, September 16, 2000. N0. 148013. PRICE: ¢1000

IT is no longer a dream that the 21st Century is for information revolution and global knowledge through Communications Technology. Thus, any nation that fails to put the necessary information infrastructure in place should not blame Jesus if its citizens have no access to information in Heaven.

On. Thursday, September 7, 2000 at the Ankobra Hall within Novotel in Accra, the Ministry of Communications, for that matter Ghana Government launched what was termed a National Information Clearing House (NICH) pilot project.

The basic objective of this project among other things, is to create awareness of the existence of an electronic information and communication channel to facilitate exchange of information between government institutions, private sector organisations, the academia, NGOs and the general public as a whole.

As a matter of fact, it is imperative to put on record that the launching of the NICH was just one aspect of a major country wide programme for Communication and Development in collaboration with other sectors of the economy. Some of the main partners in this country programme include the ministries of Education, Health, Agriculture, Environment, Science and Technology, as well as the Ghana Society of Information Technology, the Internet Society of Ghana and others. The entire programme was under the tutorialship of the International Institute for Communication and Development (IICD) based in The Hague, The Netherlands.

Hon. John Mahama, the Communications Minister who performed the launching event on behalf of his other colleagues told stakeholders in the Information Technology (IT) business that it is the priority of the Government to extend Communications and Information infrastructure to the rural areas for the economic prosperity of ordinary people. He cautioned that in our anxiety to implement Information Communications Technology (ICT) programme a care must be taken in order not to create what he termed as "information" "haves" and "have nots".  There is therefore the need to provide affordable computer literacy, Internet and telecommunications services to our rural brothers and sisters the Minister noted.

According to the Director of International Institute of Communication and Development, the Global Teenager project is committed to stimulating the use of ICTs for the creation of cross-cultural understanding with focus on two-way communication between students in different countries. Its motto is: "Today's Learners Are Tomorrow's Leaders”.

Dr Nii Quanor or NCS, who is also the President of Internet Society of Ghana said that in future multimedia information economy, the places (town, country and region) where bandwidth and Information Technology do not pass will be less developed. "That's what happened to some cities each time railways, roads, air routes, in general where transportation arrived, it influenced development", Dr Quanor said.

One other important aspect of the country programme which was also launched on September 7 was the global Teenager project. Mr Mahama noted that the establishment of the National Information Clearing House project by the Communications Ministry to network the electronic information system between government and the people will greatly enhance access to information by simple click of a button.

He reasoned that if the right information infrastructure is not put in place, information will be available but people will find it difficult if not impossible to access it for development purposes.

The author works with Information Services Department (ISD) abissath@gmail.com

NB: This article was first published by Daily Graphic on Saturday, September 15, 2000.