Title
Telecentres in mountain regions: - A Peruvian case study of the impact of information and communication technologies on remoteness and exclusion
Date Issued
09 November 2009
Access level
open access
Resource Type
journal article
Author(s)
Heeks R.
University of Manchester
Abstract
Communities in developing country mountain areas, in part due to their remoteness, find themselves excluded from social, political and economic systems; and excluded from access to resources. This paper aims to study the impact of information and communication technologies (ICTs) on remoteness and exclusion. It utilises two models - the resource movement framework, and the "information chain" - to analyse a telecentre in one district of mountainous Huancavelica, Peru's poorest region, set in the high Andes. It finds ICTs enabling new and positive resource flows for the two key user groups: teenaged school students and young farmers. These help to maintain social networks. They also support information searches that have improved agricultural practice where other information chain resources have been available. But non-use and ineffective use of the telecentre are found where information chain resources are lacking. ICTs have some impacts on intangible elements of remoteness. In this particular example, they also offer access to some previously-excluded resources. But they have not really addressed the systematic exclusions faced by mountain communities. And they so far appear to be a technology of inequality; favouring those residents who begin with better resource endowments. The paper concludes by offering some recommendations for mountain ICT project practice. © Science Press, Institute of Mountain Hazards and Environment, CAS and Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2009.
Start page
320
End page
330
Volume
6
Issue
4
Language
English
OCDE Knowledge area
Ciencias sociales
Geografía social, Geografía económica
Subjects
Scopus EID
2-s2.0-70350641882
Source
Journal of Mountain Science
ISSN of the container
16726316
Sponsor(s)
The research reported here was accomplished via a grant from the International Development Research Centre, Canada, and Microsoft Corporation; and with the support of the Seminario Permanente de Investigacion Agraria (Permanent Seminar on Agricultural Research), SEPIA.
Sources of information:
Directorio de Producción Científica
Scopus