Today’s is a world of many divides, one of the most typical being the Digital Divide, which in itself has given birth to or is worsening other economic and social divides.  In this world, more suffer and less are able to benefit from technology.  This paper aims to promote the importance of and need for inter-disciplinary cooperation for the use and promotion of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) as a bridge for the Digital Divide within disciplines. Information and communication technologies (ICTs) include any communication device—radio, television, cellular phones, computer and network hardware and software, satellite systems, the services and applications associated with them, such as the Internet, geographic positioning systems (GPS), banking, e-health, e-learning and electronic government services. The paper will touch on tangible examples of inter-disciplinary cooperation and the use of ICT in different community interventions.

The IST-Africa 2011 Conference & Exhibition took place from 11 - 13 May 2011 in Gaborone, Botswana.

Part of the IST-Africa Initiative, which is supported by the European Commission under the ICT Theme of Framework Programme 7 (FP7), IST-Africa 2011 is the sixth in an Annual Conference Series bringing together delegates from leading commercial, government & research organisations, to bridge the Digital Divide by sharing knowledge, experience, lessons learnt & good practice. The European Commission co-funds the IST-Africa Initiative in order to promote the participation of African organisations to the European ICT programme.

I spent a week in rural Zambia visiting one of the rural success stories in Africa. I visited the Macha Works project, a community owned initiative to bring not only ICT but also the internet to people in rural areas. The purpose of my visit was to establish how they manage to be successful and to investigate the potential of introducing a similar concept in South Africa.

I have been nominated to serve on the International Development Informatics Association (IDIA) Board for a 3-year period as from 2011.