ERASMUS UNIVERSITEIT ROTTERDAM
ICT and its impact on the
economic development of
developing countries
How can Computers for Africa (CFA) help?
Mohammad Faizi Nazir - 332687mn
7/13/2014
Supervisor:
Niels Rietveld
Second reader: Roy Thurik
In this thesis a literature review is provided regarding the topic of ICT and its direct impact on the
economic development of developing countries, and it’s indirect impact through education. Using
these scientific insights, a business plan is developed for Computers for Africa (CFA). CFA is a
charitable organization providing old refurbished ICTs, together with other supporting services, for
non-fee schools in the Bitou area in South Africa.
Contents
1.
Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 3
2.
Background ..................................................................................................................................... 4
3.
4.
5.
2.1
Computers for Africa............................................................................................................... 4
2.2
Methodology ........................................................................................................................... 5
Literature review ............................................................................................................................. 7
3.1
What is ICT? ........................................................................................................................... 7
3.2
ICT and economic development of developing countries ....................................................... 7
3.3
Conclusion ............................................................................................................................. 16
Business Plan................................................................................................................................. 17
4.1
Executive summary ............................................................................................................... 17
4.2
Company Description ............................................................................................................ 18
4.3
Market analysis...................................................................................................................... 20
4.4
Organization and Management.............................................................................................. 26
4.5
Marketing & Sales ................................................................................................................. 27
4.6
Financial plan ........................................................................................................................ 34
Discussion ..................................................................................................................................... 46
5.1
Overcoming barriers .............................................................................................................. 46
5.2
Limitations & Challenges ...................................................................................................... 47
6.
Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 50
7.
Bibliography .................................................................................................................................. 52
Appendix ............................................................................................................................................... 55
1. Competitive analysis ..................................................................................................................... 55
2. Projected costs ............................................................................................................................... 61
2
1.
Introduction
It’s really hard for us to imagine a world without computers, tablets or laptops. These Information and
Communication Technologies (ICT’s) have become so commonplace for us, that we do not stop to
think about people who might have never come into contact with them. There is a phenomenon called
the global digital divide which is defined as a geographic difference between countries that have
access to ICT and countries that do not have access to ICT. Mostly this difference exists between
developed and developing countries, and this divide still exists (Schwab, 2013). Due to this digital
divide developing countries are deprived of the possible positive impact ICT can have on their
economic growth (El-Dharwiche, Sharma, Singh, & Samad, 2012)
There are lots of organizations over the world that have recognized this lost potential for developing
countries and thus have come into action. Camara, IT Schools Africa and Computers4Africa (UK) are
examples of these organizations. In 2010 a charity called Computers for Africa was also started in the
Netherlands. Generally speaking, they provide high-quality refurbished computers and provide other
supporting services in the Bitou area in South Africa. The purpose of this research is to investigate
how Computers for Africa (CFA) can have a positive impact on the economic development of
the area they are active in. To answers this question, the relevant scientific literature is reviewed in
this thesis, and a business plan is developed for CFA using these scientific insights.
Considering the fact that CFA is a charity, it depends on donations. When people want to donate to a
particular charity, there is always the issue of impact. They mostly don’t know what impact they have
with their donation, which might demotivate them from donating. By doing this research I provide a
concise review of the impact ICT can have on the economic development of a developing
country/area. This will provide potential donors of CFA the opportunity to see scientific evidence on
how they can impact other lives with their donations. Thus this can lead to a larger inflow of
donations, which benefits CFA. They can then in turn put much more action into closing the digital
gap between developed and developing countries/areas. South Africa as a whole is not considered to
be a developing country. Different areas in South Africa are quite developed, while other parts are
quite underdeveloped. CFA puts their focus on the underdeveloped areas by working in the rural areas.
Also, by doing this research and consequently providing a business plan for CFA, they can be
provided with much more focus. Having clear goals and having a plan on how to reach those will
make the charity much more effective in its work.
Much research has already been done on the impact of ICT on the economic development of
developed countries (Brynjolfsson & Shinkyu, 1996; Pohjola, 2001) and the general results all seem to
point towards a positive effect. But the impact of ICT on the economic growth of developing countries
is not always clear. There are mixed results in the literature (Sang-Yong, Gholami, & Tong, 2005;
Edquist, 2005; Antonelli, 1991).The scientific importance of my research then is that I provide a
concise overview of recent studies regarding the direct impact of ICT on economic development of
developing countries, and the indirect impact of ICT through education. Keeping in mind the results of
these studies I will make a business plan for CFA, thereby using scientific findings to solve a real
world problem.
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2.
Background
In this section the focus will be on two things. First of all I will highlight the background of CFA
shortly. This part is basically ‘the executive summary’ from the business plan section. The reason I do
not pay too much attention to that here, is because in the business plan I go into more depth regarding
this. Secondly, I will also explain here the methodologies I use for this research.
2.1
Computers for Africa
CFA was founded in 2010 by Jef Verschuren and Saskia Krijger. Soon after they got started, they
were joined by Ben Schotpoort. All three of them are (former) employees of the Erasmus School of
Economics at Erasmus University Rotterdam. They founded CFA with the main goal of making pupils
in South Africa digitally literate. According to Cornell University, digital literacy is the ability to find,
evaluate, utilize, share, and create content using information technologies and the internet (Cornell
University Digital Literacy Resource, 2009).
CFA is active in South Africa, the Netherlands, and Belgium. ICTs are collected in all three of the
countries, but they are meant for schools in South Africa only. Their local partners are ‘Bitou 10
Foundation’, ‘Komatsu Southern Africa (Pty) Ltd’, and ‘Komatsu Denron Community Development
Centre’.
Products/services offered
CFA aims to make pupils in South Africa digitally literate by providing them with old refurbished
computers, laptops and/or tablets and by facilitating in any other way to meet the goals of the
Foundation. CFA for instance teamed up with the Dutch founded Foundation E-learning for Kids to
provide the schools with educational software. Next to that CFA activates the start of a project like
‘train the trainer’ so that teachers and students become literate in ICT use and maintenance, and made
computers available for a community classroom.
Financial information
CFA is a charitable organization that is completely dependent on donations and sponsorships. At the
moment CFA has formed partnerships with organizations like the Erasmus University Rotterdam, IT
Donations, the Bitou10 foundation and many more. They help CFA in differing degrees with financial
donations and/or in kind donations.
Future plans
In the next three years CFA will stick to a strategy of ‘Prove, Improve and Gain Continuity’1. CFA is
convinced of the positive impact of their activities, but the outside world might need some persuasion.
Therefore, ‘prove’ refers to the fact that CFA needs to make clear the impact of their activities to the
outside world. This requires continuous monitoring and evaluation of their activities. Secondly, the
‘improve’ part of the strategy refers to improving the digital literacy of students, in
primary/elementary and high schools, in South Africa. Think here of supplying more computers to the
schools, making more efficient use of the computers, training teachers and student teachers in ICT use
1
Based partly on the Camara three year strategy; http://camara.org/wpcontent/uploads/2012/04/CamaraStrategy2014-2016-1.pdf
4
and maintenance etc. Lastly, ‘gaining continuity’ is part of the strategy, meaning that CFA needs to
increase and diversify its income portfolio.
2.2
Methodology
2.2.1 Literature review
To investigate the research question stated above, I conduct a literature review. The literature I am
interested in is about the impact of ICT on the economic development of a country. However, I
specifically want to see studies done for a developing country context, because CFA is active in a
developing country. I do not want to include literature that is too old (>20 years) because ICT itself is
a relatively new phenomenon. The most recent literature will be the most reliable simply because there
is more knowledge that has been built upon.
First of all I will look at studies specifically focusing on the impact of ICT on the economic
development of developing countries, and then I will look for studies regarding the indirect impact of
ICT on the economic development of developing countries through education. The reason for looking
at the indirect impact through education is because CFA aims to improve the educational development
of the area they are active in.
2.2.2 Business plan
There are many different ways of making a business plan. In my case, I decided to use the following
two resources:
1.
How to write a business plan, by the US Small Business Administration2
The reason for choosing this first method is because it provides a clear structure for how a formal
business plan should look like, and it is from a reliable source (U.S. Small Business Administration).
2. The right brain business plan (Lee, 2011)
The reason for choosing this second resource was to get another perspective on the process of making
a business plan. Considering that the first resource, and most other resources, are more focused on the
formal side of the business planning process, it seemed very interesting to investigate another point of
view regarding this process which puts more emphasis on the creative part of the business planning
process.
According to the first structure, a business plan should consist of the following elements:
1. Executive summary
2. Company description
3. Market analysis
4. Organization & Management
5. Service or product line
2
Retrieved from: http://www.sba.gov/category/navigation-structure/starting-managing-business/startingbusiness/how-write-business-plan
5
6. Marketing & Sales
7. Funding request
8. Financial projections
9. Appendix
Because this is a structure which is supposed to be filled in for a commercial organization, in the case
of CFA, it was not possible to apply their tips to the exact letter. First of all in the ‘market analysis’
section, a commercial organization would assume competitors in the market and then analyze them. A
charitable organization does not really have competitors though, but rather organizations they can
learn from. As was stated by Jennifer Lee (2011) it is much more appropriate to see these
organizations as ‘peers’. Secondly, the ‘company description’ section and ‘service or product line’
section were combined. The reason for doing this was because these two sections appeared to have
very much overlap in information, which therefore made sense to combine them. The company
description section is supposed to be an extended elevator pitch where information is provided on
what the organization does, how it’s different from other organizations, and the markets that are
targeted. This same information, in a more detailed way, is supposed to be included in the ‘service or
product line’ section. Together with this, there should also be information about the product lifecycle,
intellectual property, and R&D activities. Details about the services provided and what might
influence them, have been provided in the ‘market analysis’ section, so it seemed redundant to put it in
here again. Intellectual property and R&D activities both do not hold for CFA. They do not have any
intellectual property, and information about monitoring and evaluation (which can be considered
R&D) is provided in more detail in the financials section. This is a system that still needs to be setup
in the case of CFA. All of this meant that the main information contained in the ‘service or product
line’ section would just be a more detailed version of the ‘company description’ section. This would
lead to a large amount of overlapping information, which is why it was better to combine the two
sections. Thirdly, in the ‘marketing & sales section’, a sales strategy for CFA was left out. That is
simply because they do not have anything to sell due to the fact that they are a charitable organization.
Finally, the ‘funding request’ and ‘financial projections’ sections were combined. Because the
financial part of this structure was specifically geared towards commercial organizations, it did not
work for a charitable organization. A resource that was specifically geared towards a charitable
organization and their financial plan was therefore used for this section, which was made by the Cass
Centre for Charity Effectiveness (Effectiveness, 2012).
The second resource used in making the business plan was the right brain business plan (Lee, 2011).
This is a book that places the emphasis on creativity in making the business plan, by realizing a visual
business plan. The visual business plan is more suited for situations where one needs a business plan
for personal use, instead of situations where a business plan is needed for formal use. Even without
actually making the visual business plan, this book can be quite helpful due to the provided tips and
exercises. These exercises were helpful in identifying the vision, mission, and values of CFA.
Alongside those exercises, there were also many tips regarding how to search for information more
effectively.
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3.
Literature review
In this literature review I am interested in finding out what has been written about the impact of ICT
on economic growth. This technological change has been affecting many countries, but I am mainly
interested in its impact on developing countries. The reason for this being that CFA is active in
developing countries, which makes this review much more useful for them.
First of all I will explain the concept of Information Communication Technologies (ICT). What does it
mean, and what falls under that category? Secondly, I will look into what has been written about the
direct and indirect impact of ICT on the economic development of developing countries. The possible
indirect relationship I am interested in is when the effect of ICT on economic development goes
through education. I look at education specifically because the main focus of CFA is to significantly
impact the educational sector in developing countries by providing ICT’s. In this last section I will
also list the barriers that exist for effective implementation of ICT in the educational sector of
developing countries, together with ideas presented in the literature on how to overcome those.
3.1
What is ICT?
Basically ICT encompasses all technology that aids in the processing, transfer and exchange of
information and communication services (Osterwalder, 2002). You could think of computers, laptops,
tablets, smart phones, the internet and more. Thurik, Stam, & Audretsch (2013) document how
modern information technology developed to where it is today. The start of modern information
technology seems to begin with the invention of the transistor at Bell Labs in 1947. This transistor
replaced the vacuum tube in computers and televisions and enabled the transistor radio. The coinvention of the integrated circuit by Texas instruments in 1958 and Fairchild semiconductor in 1959
was one of the next major milestones in ICT. These inventions enabled the handheld calculator for
example. The microprocessor was the third invention invented in 1971 by Intel. It became a major
input to the development and diffusion of the microcomputer in the 1970s and the personal computer
in the 1980s. In the 1990s the era of the internet started, which was basically computer networking
(Castells, 1996; Fransman, 2002; Thurik, Stam, & Audretsch, 2013).
3.2
ICT and economic development of developing countries
3.2.1 Direct impact
There seems to be great optimism about the positive impacts of ICTs on the economic development of
a country. It seems that ICTs can provide countries the ability to leapfrog in economic development. In
most developing countries it is difficult to find much evidence of this ICT induced economic growth
(Avgerou, 1998). Most of the reported empirical studies on developing countries and
recommendations are based on implicit assumptions about the economic value of ICT developments
(Avgerou, 1998). These countries appear to quickly want to apply these new technologies, without
actually trying to understand if and how they work. So before moving on to the available empirical
evidence, we will take a look at the theoretical evidence regarding the impact of ICT on the economic
growth of developing countries.
Avgerou (1998) uses economic and social theory to show the economic significance of ICT to a
country. This is investigated for developed countries, but implications for developing countries are
also derived. What Avgerou (1998) states is that economic and social theory appear to suggest that
7
more ICT does not necessarily lead to more economic growth for developed and developing countries.
Because of the increased technology, organizations and economies are faced with changes that they
have to deal with. The technology can change the way organizations do business or deliver their
services. Same is also stated by Indjikian (2005) who talks about many economists ignoring the role of
organizational change in the implementation of new technologies. Implementation of these
technologies can have a huge impact on the work environment since they may simultaneously result in
downsizing, retraining of the remaining workforce, and changes in job responsibilities. The
implications for developing countries, according to Avgerou (1998), are therefore that investing in
ICT is necessary to partake in the global economy, but that it does not guarantee economic growth.
Next to gathering resources to fund investments in ICT, these countries then also have to figure out
how to deal with the organizational and economic changes that occur due to more technology.
Kirkman, Cornelius, & Schawb (2002) state that there is great optimism over the potential of ICT to
promote economic growth of developing countries. What is missing however is a solid theoretical base
and convincing empirical evidence for this argument, which they try to provide in their paper. The
theoretical argument they provide is that of ICT having a positive impact on the efficiency of markets
in developing countries. There is increased information dissemination due to ICT, which enables more
people in rural areas (mostly producers, farmers) to have access to these markets. This increases the
market efficiency, meaning that scarce resources are allocated more efficiently. Having increased
market efficiency then increases the Marshallian surplus, thus leading to more welfare. Increased
welfare translates itself into a better economic development. According to this reasoning they give
then, ICT is supposed to have a positive impact on the economic development of a developing
country. In some ways this is similar to the argument provided by Avgerou (1998) where he says that
ICT positively impacts economic growth when, ICT induced organizational and economic change has
been dealt with. If markets become more efficient then that is an indication of the economy adjusting
as a consequence of ICT. The markets function better, meaning that in this case then ICT should
indeed have positive impacts on economic development. However, even with markets becoming more
efficient and the economy therefore adjusting, it does not mean that organizations have also learnt how
to deal with the change. That can still be a factor then hindering the positive impact of ICT on
economic growth.
Moving on to some empirical evidence, Indjikian (2005) reviews a large amount of qualitative and
quantitative evidence on the impact of ICT on economic performance. The findings of this study are
fairly robust, because of the large body of literature reviewed which all seem to point towards a
positive correlation between ICT and economic performance. Important to note is that most of these
results are derived from developed economies. So he is not directly able to say what the impact of ICT
on economic performance is in developing countries, but he does talk about some key deficiencies that
policymakers in developing countries should address to acquire more social benefits from investments
in ICT. The first key deficiency that needs to be addressed is the lack of knowledge of ‘best practices’.
This means that firms in developing countries should acquire the knowledge on how to best use ICT in
their sector. They can learn this by looking at the developed countries and see how they acquire
success. This argument made here does not contradict with what Avgerou (1998) said regarding
homogenization. He was making the case against homogenization, meaning that he was against
developing countries taking over best practices from developed countries. Indjikian (2005) simply
states that firms in developing countries should have more knowledge of these best practices, so they
are able to make a more educated decision regarding how to use ICT efficiently in their respective
sectors. The second deficiency that needs to be addressed is the underinvestment in ICT-related
technologies. ICT-related technologies make up the infrastructure that is necessary to support efficient
8
use of the ICT. Governments should therefore create an investment friendly environment to make
investments in ICT-related technology more attractive. Another major obstacle is the ICT-related skill
deficiencies in the workforce. Governments can tackle this obstacle by providing training in state-run
educational institutions. They can also incentivize firms to provide these trainings themselves, by
giving subsidies or tax benefits.
One of the important issues that policymakers in developing countries deal with is to choose where to
spend their limited resources on. Indjikian (2005) calls this the opportunity cost argument where
investments elsewhere might generate higher social returns. One example that he gives is to improve
access of women to education versus investing in ICT. This shows that developing countries have to
deal with other challenges compared to developed countries, which is also in line with Avgerou
(1998). Although it is very difficult to reject the opportunity cost argument in most cases, evidence
suggests that developing countries can increase the probability of catching up to more advanced
countries through well-targeted investments in ICT and internet-related technologies (Indjikian, 2005).
In their paper, Lee, Gholami, & Tong (2005) claim that a lot of previous studies done to evaluate the
impact of ICT investments were lacking in methodology. Therefore, they use Solow’s residual
together with time series analysis to overcome some of those methodological issues of previous
studies. With this approach they conduct a study of 20 countries to be able to determine whether there
is emperical evidence to support claims of ICT investments being worthwile. These 20 countries are a
mix of developed and developing countries. What their results show is that ICT does contribute to
economic growth in many developed countries, but not in developing countries. The possible
explanation for these differences in results between developed and developing countries are probably
ICT-complementary factors. These are basically the components, or the experience, a country needs to
have, before investments in ICT become productive. Previous studies show that the crucial
components needed for this experience are specialized infrastructure, human resources, research and
development, low tarriffs on computer imports, telecommunication liberalization, adaptive business
models, and reorganization of manual processes (Lee, Gholami, & Tong, 2005). So the conclusion to
be drawn from this is that countries that have invested in ICT over a long period of time, thus
acquiring a substantial base, and have made complementary investments in telecom and human
resources, are better able to achieve positive significant returns to ICT. The implication of this is that
developing countries can benefit by promoting ICT-use and creating the environmental conditions
needed to support the effective use of ICT (Lee, Gholami, & Tong, 2005).
Much of the results presented by various papers seem to lead to a similar conclusion regarding the
impact of ICT on economic performance of developing countries. Investments in ICT have the
potential for economic growth in developing countries, but it requires investments in other
components as well. Avgerou (1998) talks about the necessary ability of developing countries to deal
with the ICT-induced organizational (e.g. workforce lacking knowledge and skill to work with ICT)
and economic change. This idea is also supported by Indjikian (2005) who reviewed a large amount
of qualitative and quantitative literature. Het talks about one of the key deficiencies that policymakers
in developing countries need to deal with is the underinvestment in ICT-related technology. If this
supporting infrastructure is not available, then the country will not be able to reap full benefits from
ICT. Lee, Gholami, & Tong (2005) show in their results that ICT does seem to have a positive effect
on the economic growth of developed countries, but not of developing countries. They ascribe this
difference to investments in ICT-complementary factors. These are the factors a country needs before
it can reap full benefits from ICT, and developed countries are much further in this compared to
developing countries. The common result then is that developing countries need to invest in
9
complementary factors(training, infrastructure, telecommunications etc.) if they want to maximize the
benefits of their ICT investments. Because it is not always the case that investments in ICT have a
positive impact on the economic growth of a developing country.
3.2.2 Indirect impact through education
Intuitively one would expect that education has a positive impact on economic growth. To back this
intuition up, there is a large amount of literature available providing evidence for this relationship
(Gylfason, 2001). In this section then I will investigate the literature regarding the impact of ICT on
education in developing countries.
There are numerous examples of ICTs being used in education all over the world. The question then is
whether the use of ICTs in education is really beneficial for student learning and the educational sector
as a whole. The effect of these ICT’s on education depends on the way they are used for educational
purposes. By simply putting a computer, or other state of the art technology, in a school, there will be
no significant impact on student learning (Wagner et al., 2005; Kent & Mcnergney, 1999; Khan,
Hasan, & Clement, 2012; Candiotti & Clarke, 1998). It also makes a difference on the impact whether
ICT is used as a complementary tool to current educational practices, or as a revolutionary tool to
reform current educational practices (Punie, Zinnbauer, & Cabrera, 2006). A similar distinction is
made by Niederhauser & Stoddart (1994) who points out that ICT usage in schools can differ from
traditional to innovative. Niederhauser & Stoddart (2001) distinguish between two types of software
uses in classrooms which are skill-based transmission software, and open-ended constructivist
software. The skill-based transmission software has the goal to enhance students’ skills by giving them
drills to practice on the computer. Open-ended software however can have the goal to help the students
build op knowledge by its use (Jonassen, 1999; Squires, 1999; Smeets, 2005).This is where ICT is
used more as a revolutionary tool to reform current educational practice. Research shows however,
that the focus in schools is more on the traditional skill-based use of ICT in education.
Why bother using ICT in classrooms?
In his paper Smeets(2005) talks about the different applications ICTs can have in classrooms. Through
ICT there is the possibility for students to access a large amount of information through multiple
resources and multiple perspectives. ICTs can also make complex processes easier to understand
through the use of simulations. Co-operative learning and reflecting about content is also stimulated
by use of ICT. Lastly, ICT can also function as an excellent tool for curriculum differentiation where
the learning contents and tasks can be adapted to the needs and capabilities of individual students.
Evidence on the impact of ICT on education
Policymakers in developing countries are constantly struggling with the problem of where to allocate
resources to. Which project gives the most benefits to the country, will be the project that resources
will be allocated to. Intuitively people seem to expect that ICT has a positive impact on classroom
education, but for the developing country context there seems to be a lack of research to support this
idea (Trucano, 2005; Wagner et al., 2005; Steyn & Johanson, 2011). This makes it difficult for these
policymakers to choose investments in ICT for education, because they would rather choose to
allocate resources to a project which has been ‘proven’ to be beneficial. This is similar to the
opportunity cost argument raised by Indjikian (2005).
10
Quantitative and qualitative studies
Steyn & Johanson (2011) have condensed the available empirical evidence on the educational impacts
of ICT in developing countries. They talk about the benefits of randomized control trials for evaluating
the educational impact of ICTs, which is basically the ability to generalize the results of the study
beyond the study participants. Especially in a country where funding is limited, this is an important
consideration for creating effective evaluation programs.
In their review they uncovered two experimental evaluations by Linden, Banerjee, & Duflo (2003) and
He, Linden, & Macleod (2007). Linden, Banerjee, & Duflo (2003) show positive impacts of Computer
Assisted Learning (CAL) in India on student achievement outcomes. The authors of this study used a
randomized experimental evaluation eventually showing highly significant positive results. The
second experimental study is by He, Linden, & Macleod (2007) which uses a randomized design to
assess the outcomes of several modes of implementation of an Indian English curriculum. The results
showed that the implementations were all equally effective on average, but that students benefitted
differentially from individual technologies. This research therefore shows the benefits of randomized
evaluations because they can show the different effects of ICTs on subgroups. This can then form the
basis for relevant and needs-based interventions. Linden (2008) notes something very important that
although these studies show ICTs to have positive impacts on student learning; this only occurs when
ICTs change pedagogical methods, or when updates to resources happen alongside upgrades to
instruction. So ICT may not be the solution itself, but it may be its impact on pedagogy that improves
the learner’s outcomes. Linden (2008) also investigates the impact of another Computer Assisted
Learning program on student achievement in India. In this study he questions the thinking of many
people that introducing ICT in a classroom will lead to more productivity in that classroom. Linden
(2008) evaluates the impact of ICT when used as a complement or as a substitute to the current
teaching program. He found, very interestingly, that when ICT was used as a substitute (student’s
independently practicing math exercises one hour daily) student learning appeared to decrease. When
ICT was used as a complement to classroom teaching, it appeared to increase student learning.
These studies show that it is not always ICT that leads to better student learning, but how it is applied
and how it interacts with the existing resources which determine its success.
Kozma, McGhee, Quellmalz, & Zalles (2004) evaluated the World Links program which was an
initiative of the World Bank Economic Development Institute. They basically conducted a pilot
program with the goal of establishing global, educational on-line communities for secondary school
students and teachers to expand distance learning opportunities and build broad support for economic
and social development. The evaluation of this World Links program was using a quasi-experimental
design and had its focus on a broad range of outcomes. Kozma, McGhee, Quellmalz, & Zalles (2004)
created surveys to collect data on the services provided by the program, for the purpose of testing the
effects of this program. These surveys were distributed to students, teachers, technology coordinators,
and administrators. The findings of this evaluation suggest that ICTs being applied with teacher
training programs, and innovative, student centered pedagogic techniques, can create significant
changes in the educational sector of developing countries.
Light et al. (2008) made an evaluation of the Jordan Education Initiative (JEI). This was an
educational project launched with four main objectives: improving the delivery of education to
Jordan’s citizens, through public-private partnerships; unleashing the innovation of teachers and
students through the effective use of ICT; building capacity of the local information technology
industry; and creating a model of reform that can be used by other countries. The evaluation used
11
quantitative and qualitative approaches to data collection. The findings of this evaluation indicate that
the outcomes of the JEI program do not fully align with the objectives that this program has. Improved
student learning and positive student outcomes have not been fully realized through the program. This
is, as is suggested before as well, mainly due to how teachers perceive ICT. This perception then
influences the way they use ICT in the classrooms. Simply as a complementary tool to practice some
drills on, or as a revolutionary tool to revolutionize approaches to learning. The majority of teachers
from this initiative used ICT as complementary tools.
These abovementioned studies, while not much, are methodologically quite strong. They show mixed
findings regarding the educational impacts of ICT in developing countries. What they do have in
common though is the reasoning for when ICT positively impacts education. It is not only when you
put a computer in a classroom that it will have positive impacts on student learning. In these cases ICT
will simply be used as a complementary tool for practicing simple drills. If aiming for a revolutionary
use of ICT, then it is also necessary to provide teachers the proper training to get comfortable with the
ICT. This will change their perception towards ICT and make them more open towards incorporating
it in their classroom in innovative ways, thus also changing pedagogy. The changed pedagogy could in
the end be the real factor having a positive impact on student learning.
Qualitative studies
Steyn & Johanson (2011) also look at some qualitative studies done on the educational impacts of
ICTs in developing countries. One of these studies was done by a team of researchers from Chile and
Costa Rica. These researchers investigated the educational impacts of ICTs on the program, school,
and classroom level (Alvarez, et al., 1998). In Chile they evaluated the Enlaces project which was
started in 1993. Enlaces created a telecommunications and computer network among 100 Chilean
primary schools and educational institutions to promote a variety of outcomes including ‘cooperative
learning, higher level thinking, data management and communication skills’ (Alvarez et al., 1998). In
Costa Rica the Costa Rican Computers in Education program was selected for evaluation. This project
had started in 1988 with the goal of improving the quality of education and to increase children’s
access to technology in poor areas. While this study of Alvarez et al. (1998) does not directly address
student learning, it addresses behavioral shifts that might occur due to the introduction of technology.
According to the authors these are important predictors for student learning. Results of this evaluation
showed that students did collaborate more while using computers and students were less fearful and
more autonomous than in the non-ICT classrooms. Interviews with teachers suggested that the
students seemed to have a better behavior after the introduction of technology in the classrooms.
Lastly, some of the teachers and principals interviewed indicated that after the introduction of
technology in the classrooms students thinking skills were enhanced, their abilities were enhanced to
be more active and involved in learning, and it improved the level of sophistication and creativity of
some student-developed work. Even though these results seem to go in a positive direction, they have
some limitations. The reasons for that being a biased sampling method, possible underestimations of
the challenges, and outdated research. The researchers only had those schools in the sample that met
certain criteria and were most successful in the implementation of the technology in classrooms. This
leads to non-representative biased samples. Also, by only including the schools that were successful in
implementing the technology, the challenges associated with implementation will possibly be
underestimated. Finally, this research is from 1990 and from then to now there have been lots of
changes in technology, students and other relevant factors that influence the educational impact of
ICTs.
12
Another qualitative study was the one of Waitayangkoon (2004) where the author evaluated the impact
of handheld technologies in math and science enrichment programs in Thailand. The program targeted
upper secondary students from seven schools, and provided them with handheld devices while also
providing the teachers with professional development and curriculum materials on how to integrate the
handheld devices into the classroom. Results from this research suggested that students worked more
collaboratively, were more enthusiastic and were more curious towards learning, to just name a few
positive effects mentioned by this study. In short, the handheld devices seemed to have a positive
impact on student learning. The results of this study also have to deal with some limitations, partly due
to the issue of the authors not having mentioned their methodology of their research in their paper. The
importance of these results though are that schools with lack of knowledge about ICT, and their lack
of infrastructure and connectivity for ICT, can still successfully implement handheld devices in
classrooms by support from school leadership and a network of other stakeholders.
The One laptop per child (OLPC) initiative had the aim to increase children’s access to inexpensive
computing technology, especially for the developing countries where they lack resources. A pilot test
with a case study approach was conducted by Härtel (2008) in order to assess the impact of low-cost
computing devices- more specifically the OLPC XO laptop- on disadvantaged children in the
developing world. Next to educational software they also added Melepo, which allowed the Ethiopian
textbooks to be digitalized. The pilot test was also used to assess the fit of Melepo on the OLPC XO
laptops in Ethiopian classroom. It is important to note that some teachers, of the participating schools,
took part in training where they could learn basic computing. Härtel (2008) undertook a formative
evaluation of this OLPC initiative, over a six week period. The results showed that students
understood how to open intended applications, and the students also said the initiative increased their
motivation for learning (Steyn & Johanson, 2011). Teachers were requesting additional training
sessions to learn intermediate computer applications. They stated that due to the training they had less
fear and resistance towards introducing the technology in their classroom. This pilot suffered from
several challenges, which is partly because it was qualitative field research (Steyn & Johanson, 2011).
Faulty hardware resulted in some cases that students had to share computers. This means that they
could not fully see the impact of the 1:1 goal; to provide each teacher and student with a laptop. Also,
the design of the evaluation that was undertaken was descriptive, and the sample size was quite small.
Lastly, the evaluation took place over a couple of months which is a short period if you want to
extrapolate results from it.
From these reviewed qualitative studies mixed results come forward regarding the educational impact
of ICT, mainly due to the biases associated with these studies. The main issue in these studies was the
lack of quantitative evidence, because qualitative evidence on its own is less robust. They do not
provide solid evidence to base policy decisions on (Steyn & Johanson, 2011). Studies using
quantitative and qualitative methods to assess the educational impacts of ICT would therefore be best.
However, the results these studies provide us with are quite consistent with the results of the studies
that were methodologically sounder. The results of these qualitative studies suggest that for the
effective use of ICT in classrooms one should also provide proper teacher training for example.
Making ICT in classrooms a success is not simply a matter of dropping a computer in a classroom. It
is a continuing effort by multiple stakeholders- students, teachers, and parents- to make the ICT have
positive impacts on student learning.
Barriers for the effective implementation of ICT in education
By looking at the reviewed studies, one could conclude that they all point to the fact that ICT seems to
have a lot of potential to positively impact ICT in education. However, this is only the case if ICT is
13
used effectively. Trying to implement ICT effectively in education in developing countries is not
always an easy task. There are some barriers that these countries have to overcome. The following
barriers listed are based on the work of Khan, Hasan, & Clement (2012). These are regarding the
specific example of Bangladesh, but can also be considered for other developing countries.
The barriers for effective implementation of ICT in education can be divided into first-order (internal)
barriers and second-order (external) barriers (Keengwe, Onchwari, & Wachira, 2008; Khan, Hasan, &
Clement, 2012). First-order barriers are issues dealing with resources like lack of technological
equipment, unreliability of equipment, and lack of support for the equipment. Second-order barriers
also include the school level factors such as the teacher’s perception towards technology and their
openness to change.
There is a lack of resources and supporting infrastructure for the effective implementation of ICT. In
most developing countries, like Bangladesh, a continuous electricity supply is lacking thus making it
impossible to sometimes even run a computer. Developing a proper ICT supporting infrastructure
requires reliable electricity supply. Furthermore, to implement ICT effectively also requires different
resources like computers, printers, and scanners. Hardware and software also need to stay up-to-date
and high-speed internet is also quite important. All of these resources are lacking in these developing
country schools, thus hindering the effective implementation of ICT in classrooms.
Lack of funding is another huge barrier for the effective implementation of ICT in most developing
countries. All of the technology, together with its supportive infrastructure, requires a large amount of
funding. Knowing that most people in these countries live below the poverty line, it means that
acquiring these necessary funds is quite difficult for them. Mumtaz (2000) states that many scholars
propose lack of funds being a main reason for teachers not to use technology in class. Next to the
inflated costs, sometimes the ICTs also turn out to be poor value for money. Wims & Lawler (2008)
have evaluated the impact of ICTs in educational institutions in Kenya. They have found that in some
cases private companies provide ICTs to schools through agreements from which they can recoup their
full cost, and eventually start making a profit at the schools expense. Having little funding, paired with
overinflated costs therefore is a huge barrier for the effective implementation of ICT in educational
institutions.
Sharma (2003) states that the most notable barriers to the use of ICT in education in developing
countries seems to be the political will of the people that are in power. The leaders of these countries
more often than not seem to rather spend money on sectors other than education. From the budgetary
allocations of a lot of third world countries, one can see that they may spend more money on defense
forces rather than on education (Khan, Hasan, & Clement, 2012).
Many social and cultural factors also hinder the effective implementation of ICT in education. In lots
of developing countries, like Bangladesh, women have a very low social status which according to
Sharma (2003) is one of the main significant social factors influencing the use of ICT in these
countries. Hence providing education or letting these women use ICT is not considered to be
important. Considering that they make up almost half of the population in Bangladesh, this is a large
population group being deprived of education. Also in Bangladesh, language, lack of education and
lack of skills to work with ICT are key barriers to the effective use of ICT. Language appears to be one
of the major social barriers in Bangladesh at the moment because most software is written in English,
while the main language in Bangladesh is Bangla (Wims & Lalwer, 2008; Khan, Hasan, & Clement,
2012). It is very well possible that these issues also exist in developing countries other than
Bangladesh.
14
In most developing countries, corruption has found its way in the system (Khan, Hasan, & Clement,
2012). This hinders the development of a country immensely, and more specifically, it hinders the
effective implementation of ICT in education. Government funds are being channeled in other
directions where few people benefit from those funds. These misused government funds could have
been used to improve other sectors like education.
Another major obstacle that needs to be overcome for the effective implementation of ICT in
education, are the attitudes and beliefs of teachers. Teachers' attitudes have been found to be major
predictors of the use of new technologies in instructional settings (Smeets, 2005; Wagner et al., 2005;
Steyn & Johanson, 2011). Mumtaz (2000) states that teachers' beliefs about teaching and learning with
ICT are central to integration. Teacher’s attitudes towards computers affect teachers’ use of computers
in the classroom and the likelihood of their benefiting from training (Kluever et al., 1994). Teachers
with positive attitudes towards ICT itself will be positive towards using it in the classroom. These
positive attitudes are developed when teachers feel comfortable about the technology and are
knowledgeable about its use (Afshari et al., 2009). Smeets (2005) shows in his research that from a list
of factors influencing the use of ICT in the learning environment in the Netherlands, teachers beliefs
about the potential of ICT and their confidence in working with ICT really matters. Steyn & Johanson
(2011) looked at a qualitative study of Hollow (2008) where the impact of the XO laptop initiative in
Ethiopia was evaluated. Teachers there received training for some basic computing skills. After the
evaluation period, teachers had stated that they had less fear and resistance towards introducing the
technology in their classroom due to the training received (Steyn & Johanson, 2011). So beliefs about
the potential of ICT in the classroom, together with the skill and knowledge teachers need to work
with these ICTs are important factors influencing the effective implementation of ICT in education.
To be able to work away the lack of knowledge and skills that teachers have, or think about ways of
incorporating ICT in the classrooms, they need to be given the time to do so. In most developing
countries teachers are overloaded with work, leaving them little time to do so. This is crucial because
if a teacher does not become comfortable with the technology, he will then be less likely to use it in
his classroom. Thus, teachers lacking time is another barrier to the effective implementation of ICTs in
education.
Recommendations on overcoming barriers to implementation
There are some recommendations mentioned in the literature on how to overcome the abovementioned
barriers. These recommendations are based mainly on the work of Khan, Hasan, & Clement (2012).
The lack of funding is a huge barrier that needs to be overcome. Due to limited funding schools are
also not able to get the important resources and build up the infrastructure necessary for the effective
use of ICT. Companies could provide computers and other necessary ICT for prices equal to the
production cost to these schools. Wims & Lawler (2008) have shown that in Kenya there are cases
where private companies provide ICTs to schools while recouping their own costs, and even making a
profit off of the schools. This should not be the case, because this makes the technology less
affordable for these schools. If the companies do provide the ICTs cheaply, then they will not make a
profit and even possibly make a loss. This is therefore not in all cases a viable solution. Donations of
ICTs could be a possibility to counter the problem of limited funding of the schools. However, not in
all cases is this very beneficial because donated ICTs sometimes incur a lot of expenditures.
According to Wims & Lawler (2008) these expenses are sometimes equivalent to the purchase of a
new machine due to the added importation duties, the loading of licensed software, and in some case
reconditioning and replacing some parts. So it is important to note that when wanting to donate ICTs
15
to schools, they should be almost ready to use. In this way the schools will not have to incur a lot of
extra expenditures to be able to use the ICTs. Computers to be donated could simply be computers that
have exceeded their usage period in firms and thus have depreciated in the books. In most cases firms
would throw the old ones away and buy new ones. However, the old ones still work fine, thus it being
a waste to throw them away. With a little reconditioning and possible replacing of some parts, these
computers can be given a new life that they can enjoy in the schools of these developing countries.
Individual consumers can also give their old, still working, computers as donations to these schools.
The lack of women in education and ICT can be solved by the government of that particular country.
The government needs to define proper strategies and policies for encouraging more women to enroll
in education and to use ICTs (Khan, Hasan, & Clement, 2012). Sharma (2003) states that policymakers should try to accommodate all sectors in a country (also the rural areas, women and disabled)
while planning for the adoption of ICT. For tackling the language problem of the software, local
software companies should work together with teachers to develop software which is in an
understandable language for the teachers and the students of that area.
Then there is also the lack of knowledge and skills in teachers regarding these new technologies. This
can be simply solved by providing these teachers with trainings to improve their knowledge and skills.
They need to be taught on how to use these ICTs themselves and how to use them effectively in their
classrooms. Afshari et al. (2009) states that teachers need to undergo professional development to
enable them to effectively use technology to improve student learning. These trainings should not be
of a short duration, because that would not be enough for teachers to build up the proper knowledge
and skills (Khan, Hasan, & Clement, 2012). To be able to undergo training on how to work with ICTs,
teachers need to be given the opportunity to do so. One of the important reasons they don’t work with
the ICTs is because of their lack of time. Schools should therefore provide timeslots for when teachers
can have these trainings, without overloading the teachers with a huge workload.
3.3
Conclusion
In this literature review I provided an overview of studies done regarding the direct and indirect
impact of ICT on economic development of developing countries. For developed countries it is clear
that most of the literature seems to point to a positive correlation between ICT and economic
development. For developing countries there seem to be mixed results found in the different studies.
Overall what can be seen in both the direct impact of ICT and its indirect impact on education is that
ICT does seem to have potential for impacting economic development positively, but this has to go
along with investments in other complementary areas. ICT-complements are necessary to make ICT
have a positive impact on the economic performance of developing countries. When talking about
ICT-complements one can think of supporting infrastructure, knowledge and skills of the workforce
and teachers, developed telecommunications sector and more. In most case developed countries are
much more developed in these complementary areas, which is why they reap more benefits of ICT
investments. In contrast to developing countries who are lagging in the ICT area and the ICTcomplements area.
16
4.
Business Plan
In this section the business plan for CFA will be presented. As mentioned above in the ‘methodology’
section, the business plan was made using two resources: the website of the U.S. Small Business
Administration regarding how to make a business plan, and a book of Jennifer Lee(2011) called ‘The
Right-Brain Business Plan’. The structure of this business plan will closely resemble the structure
presented by the U.S. Small Business Administration.
4.1
Executive summary3
The mission statement
To aid in the educational development of elementary and secondary school pupils in impoverished
areas, thereby brightening their future.
Company information
CFA was formed in 2010 by Jef Verschuren and Saskia Krijger. Soon after they got started, they were
joined by Ben Schotpoort. All three of them are (former) employees of the Erasmus School of
Economics. They founded CFA with the main goal of making students in South Africa digitally
literate. According to Cornell University, digital literacy is the ability to find, evaluate, utilize, share,
and create content using information technologies and the internet.
CFA is active in South Africa, the Netherlands, and Belgium. ICTs are collected in the Netherlands
and Belgium, and meant for schools in South Africa only. CFA works together with the local South
African partners ‘Bitou 10 Foundation’, ‘Komatsu Southern Africa (Pty) Ltd’, and ‘Komatsu Denron
Community Development Centre’.
Products/services offered
CFA aims to make elementary and secondary school pupils in South Africa digitally literate by
providing them with old refurbished computers, laptops and/or tablets and by facilitating in any other
way to meet the goals of the Foundation. CFA for instance teamed up with the Dutch founded
Foundation E-learning for Kids to provide the schools with educational software, and with IT
Donations to make it easier for firms to get rid of their old computers in a certified way. Next to that
CFA activated the start of a project like ‘train the trainer’ so that teachers and students become literate
in ICT use and maintenance, and made computers with e-learning software available for a community
classroom.
Financial information
CFA is a charitable organization that is completely dependent on donations and sponsorships. At the
moment CFA has formed partnerships with organizations like Erasmus University Rotterdam, IT
Donations, the Bitou10 foundation and many more. They help CFA in differing degrees with financial
donations and/or in kind donations.
Future plans
3
This is also listed in the ‘Background’ section of this paper.
17
In the next three years CFA will stick to a strategy of ‘Prove, Improve and Gain Continuity’. CFA is
convinced of the positive impact of their activities, but the outside world might need some persuasion.
Therefore, ‘prove’ refers to the fact that CFA needs to make clear the impact of its activities to the
outside world. This requires continuous monitoring and evaluation of its activities. Secondly, the
‘improve’ part of the strategy refers to improving the digital literacy of elementary and secondary
school pupils in South Africa. Think here of supplying more computers to the schools, making more
efficient use of the computers, training teachers and student teachers in ICT use and maintenance etc.
Lastly, ‘gaining continuity’ is part of the strategy, meaning that CFA needs to increase and diversify
their income portfolio.
4.2
Company Description
In this section different elements of CFA will be reviewed. Here I will highlight what needs CFA
wants to satisfy, with what products/services it intend to do that, who its desired customers are, and
what its competitive advantages are.
4.2.1
The organization and their customers
By nature CFA is a non-profit organization active in the educational sector. Its mission is to aid in the
educational development of students in impoverished areas, with a specific focus on the East Cape
Region in South Africa at the moment. Its goal is to increase the digital literacy of the students in
South Africa. According to Cornell University, digital literacy is the ability to find, evaluate, utilize,
share, and create content using information technologies and the internet4.
The reason they want to improve the digital literacy of these students, is because they want to bridge
the digital divide. The global digital divide is defined as a geographic difference between countries
that have access to ICT and countries that do not have access to ICT. Mostly this difference exists
between developed and developing countries, and this divide still exists (Schwab, 2013). Due to this
digital divide, developing countries are deprived of the possible positive impact ICT can have on their
economic growth (El-Dharwiche, Sharma, Singh, & Samad, 2012). By providing ICTs as tools to
improve the educational development, these developing countries have a better chance of breaking out
of their impoverished state.
Technology has been shown to have the power to have a huge positive impact on the educational
development of students (Smeets, 2005). However, there are many barriers that prevent the effective
implementation of technology in developing countries (see literature review).That is why the main
activity of CFA is providing old refurbished computers (with computers that are 6 years old at
maximum) which are collected in the Netherlands, and Belgium. In the future it is possible that CFA
will try to also get South African firms aboard. After refurbishment, the relevant operating software is
installed on it and the educational software provided by E-learning for kids can then be run on it.
Providing old refurbished computers is possible in this day and age, because of the large amount of
ICTs used in professional and private contexts. It is much easier, and much more likely that people
nowadays (in developed countries) would have some second hand computers, tablets or laptops that
they would be willing to donate to a good cause. Considering that we are moving towards a digitalized
age where technology is being used in almost all areas of life, ICTs are here to stay for a long time.
Together with the trend towards more sustainability, this is a combination allowing CFA to be able to
provide their services for a long time to come.
4
Retrieved from: http://digitalliteracy.cornell.edu/welcome/dpl0000.html
18
It is important to note that CFA tries to provide all their services in partnerships with (preferably local)
partners. CFA tries to stimulate these partners to provide products and services like educational
software, training the teachers, training the students etc. Where needed, CFA brings the local partners
into contact with other parties and/or partners.
CFA realize that by simply putting computers in classrooms, there will not be much of a positive
impact on education. Research has shown that teachers also need to be trained in the possibilities of
the ICTs so they are not fearful of using it (see literature review). Next to that there is also the
maintenance and repair that is necessary from time to time. This is why the Bitou10 foundation is
taking up a project for training for teachers where they learn how to work with the ICTs provided. The
aim is also to provide for scholarships for student teachers to be trained in ICT maintenance and usage
at the Komatsu Denron community center. Furthermore, there is also the possibility for computer
training to be provided for other members of the community.
Even when some of these schools receive the ICTs, they sometimes may have deal with the issue of
where to put them. Or in some cases the community might need to be provided with computers, but
they have no classroom for it. In partnership with Born in Africa, CFA provided computers while Born
in Africa built the community classroom.
To allow proper digital connectivity, CFA together with their partners, try to ensure that the
participating schools also get an ADSL connection. This allows for much more possibilities for the
students, but it also allows an online knowledge sharing platform between the schools. This enables
the schools to use each other’s strengths to their advantage, and figure out how to deal with their
weaknesses collectively. This online knowledge sharing platform has not yet been brought to life. One
of the main reasons as to why this has not been realized yet is due to not all schools having an ADSL
connection yet. The first obstacle to overcome then is to provide schools with an internet connection.
The online knowledge sharing platform then should be realized with the aid of ICT interns coming
over from the Netherlands and Belgium or being hired from within South Africa. The idea is that these
interns train the teachers in ICT use and maintenance, are available for technical help, and setup a
knowledge sharing platform. By partnering with schools in the Netherlands and Belgium these interns
should, in return, get a certificate or some study points to show their experience and achievements in
this field.
The customer group that CFA addresses is students living in impoverished areas with no access to
good quality education. More specifically, CFA has decided to focus on non-fee schools in the Bitou
area in South Africa. Non-fee schools are schools that allow students to join without paying fees. The
government then funds the expenses of the schools that were previously covered by fees5. These are
schools located in townships and rural areas around the town of Plettenberg Bay in the Eastern Cape
Province (the so called Bitou area).
4.2.2
Standing out from the crowd
There is no shortage of organizations helping with ICTs in African countries. So naturally the question
then arises; what makes CFA so different from these organizations? There are multiple competitive
advantages that CFA has over other similar organizations:
1. The location that CFA is active in is quite unique. It is unique in the sense that only
Computers4Africa UK is active in South Africa, but not even in the same region as CFA is. Also,
5
Retrieved from: http://www.etu.org.za/toolbox/docs/government/schoolfees.html#no-fee
19
Computers4Africa UK provides computers to countries all over the world, which means that they do
not have the focus that CFA has. Also, CFA is collecting these old ICTs in the Netherlands and
Belgium, which is also new. There weren’t any other charitable organizations before that were
collecting old ICTs for South African schools in the Netherlands and Belgium.
2. The founders of CFA, volunteering members, and sponsors all have a strong connection with South
Africa in some way. This means that these people are intrinsically motivated to do their job at the best
of their ability.
3. CFA tries to provide computers of the same type to the South African schools. It makes computer
maintenance and repair easier and more efficient. This is why they collect computers in big batches.
4. CFA works together with local partners like the Bitou10 foundation and Komatsu Denron
community centre, who have much more expertise regarding the area and are better aware of the
needs. This allows CFA to provide services which are better tailored to the needs of those people.
5. The last and most important competitive advantage that CFA has is that it puts focus on quality over
quantity. This can be seen in their decision to only focus on a small region in South Africa at first, and
improve the educational development there. CFA doesn’t just want to transfer ICTs from location A to
location B and then leave. CFA wants to really aid in the overall educational development of students
in the area they work in, and give talented students a chance to blossom. This is a task which requires
interventions on different levels (technological, educational, organizational) which is much better done
when working in a small area at first, and providing them full focus on a multitude of levels. When a
system is developed which leads to success, CFA can then decide to broaden their focus to a larger
geographical area (adjacent to the area that is already serviced).
4.3
Market analysis
For an organization it is of importance to have knowledge of the industry and market it’s active in. To
gain this knowledge some research is needed, which is what will be presented in this section. First I
will provide an industry description and outlook. After that, information about the target market will
be provided. Lastly, a competitive analysis will be shown based on five competitors (peers) of CFA.
4.3.1 Capitalizing on trends
As mentioned in the section before, CFA is active in the educational sector of the non-profit industry
in South Africa. In this sector there are certain social and economic trends which can be of
influence/use to CFA. By capitalizing on these trends CFA could get a leg up on their peers, which is
why it is important to identify these trends:
1. Social networking
According to PEW Research center, as of September 2013, 71% of the online adults were using
Facebook (Duggan & Smith, 2014). Facebook, Twitter, Google plus are all social media which are
used on a daily basis by many people in the world. Considering this large user base, CFA can
capitalize on this trend by using social media as a marketing medium to increase their exposure in the
world. Social media is very effective in spreading out a message to a large number of people very
quickly, thus making it easier to raise awareness for the cause.
2. Sustainability
20
With discussions about climate change raging on every day, people are giving more and more
importance to sustainability. They also like to see more firms who are actively doing something about
the sustainability of the earth. Think of initiatives like CO-2 neutral production by planting trees, using
solar powered energy, using recycled materials, and a host of other initiatives. CFA can also capitalize
on this trend and they should, considering the area they work in.
Their main activity is in line with this trend, because they provide firms and individuals the
opportunity to give their ICTs a second life. Instead of throwing the ICTs away in an environmentally
unfriendly way, donating them to CFA allows them to be used again. Furthermore, at the end of their
lifetime they are recycled as well.
Secondly, there is the use of solar energy. In South Africa there is an abundance of solar energy, and it
would be a waste to not use it. Think of solar power generators for the computer classrooms and/or
individual computers running on solar power. There are similar initiatives like Dell’s Zubabox, which
is a solar powered computer container classroom. The benefit of solar energy is that it can provide the
schools in these rural areas with a much more continuous flow of energy.
3. Utilit-easers6
Especially in Africa, there is a pressing need for innovations that make life easier, which are called
utilit-easers. Providing computers, tablets and laptops is what CFA does at the moment, and that is in
line with this trend. But there are also some other interesting utilit-easers which can be used in
education, and which CFA can possibly make use of too:

Shipping containers converted into digital learning centers. This idea is similar to Dell’s
Zubabox.

The Beni American University which is an online university. For people in remote areas who
have difficulty in getting to schools, it is possible for them to still enjoy education at their
leisure with these online classes. A similar initiative is the Khan Academy which provides
online lesson modules. CFA should also employ similar initiatives, or work together with
existing organizations to provide this also in South African schools.

The Keepod 7 : This is basically an operating system running from a usb stick thus allowing
multiple people to use one computer. Each person can then store its own stuff on the Keepod,
which makes them less dependent on the hardware. This allows much more efficient and safer
use of each computer. If the computer were to crash, then the person would still have all its
data in the Keepod. No hard drive is needed. Computer maintenance is reduced as well as
other related costs! The USB technology is easy and cheap to replace. CFA could think of
working together with the Keepod.
4. Hyperactive brands8
There is a trend in Africa going on of Hyperactive brands. Brands over the continent that want to
increasingly capture these consumers’ attention with delightful, engaging, altruistic and empowering
6
Retrieved from: http://trendwatching.com/trends/utilit-easers/
Can be found at: http://keepod.org/
8
Retrieved from: http://trendwatching.com/africa/trends/5trends2014/#f-a-b-a
7
21
interactive initiatives and campaigns. So no more boring marketing campaigns to do the job for your
business if you want to succeed!
CFA can gain recognition in South Africa, by organizing different events and/or activities to promote
the cause of CFA and to also engage the consumers’ attention. CFA does something similar to this by
asking the beneficiaries in South Africa to give an in kind donation in return for the ICTs. This means
that they have to organize something for the benefit of their own community like an information
session about HIV, computer lessons for community members, or a fun and engaging sports activity.
In the Netherlands and Belgium, CFA can also organize something like a sports activity aimed at
raising money for the cause. This can raise awareness in these countries for potential donors in a
competitive and fun way. It is also possible to organize a fundraising event where multiple variety
artists voluntarily come to perform, and CFA would then receive money from the ticket sales. In other
words, there are many different and fun applications of this trend that CFA should certainly capitalize
on. Think also of awareness campaigns at schools to show them how privileged they are to have all the
technology and education that they take for granted. Also show them how easy it is to help others that
do not have this privilege.
5. FABA (For Africans, by Africans).
African solutions to African problems done the African way. Today, both domestic businesses and
global brands creating products for Africans are realizing that, in order to offer real and relevant
solutions, their offerings must reflect those customers by adopting as many region-specific features,
elements and quirks as possible. Because for more conscious consumers, not only are FABA
innovations, products and services more suited to their needs, but in many cases, they are also closely
linked to ethical and/or sustainable business practices. This is especially true when these offerings
make use of local resources such as homegrown talents, workforces or materials.
CFA does this nicely by partnering with the Bitou10 foundation and Denron community center. CFA
should work together with these partners and locals in South Africa when also contemplating other
initiatives like container classrooms, solar power generators, organizing events etc. The people from
the locality will appreciate that a lot more, and the product/service offered in the end will be much
better tailored to the specific needs.
6. Civil infonation.
Africans are embracing more accurate, empowering, objective and timely information. CFA
contributes to this need for quality information through the computers they provide to these schools.
With the addition of internet on these computers, people in these communities are able to track the
latest news for their relevant areas. In line with this trend, what CFA could also do is to provide a
digital library of books. Or they could start some Wikipedia page for schools, similar to what Camara
did.
7. Remotely great.
Brands will be trying to reach not only the urbanized populations in Africa, but also the more rural
areas that are hard to reach. Why? Because savvy brands understand that these less developed
environments can be perfect platforms for them to present their vision of Africa’s bright future and
demonstrate how they intend to successfully tackle the more arduous challenges of the continent. This
will bond the urban consumers to the brand as well, because they also started out in the rural areas.
22
CFA is acting in line with this trend by providing help to schools in rural areas and townships
specifically. For future expansions that CFA plans it could focus specifically on the rural areas. By
putting their focus on these less developed areas, they can show the vision they have of South Africa
and show how capable it is in dealing with the challenges encountered.
4.3.2 Target market
The desired customers for CFA are students in impoverished areas with no access to good quality
education. CFA has decided to specifically focus on ten non-fee schools in the Bitou area in South
Africa. For each of the ten schools I assume there to be 500 students per school, which makes the size
of the primary target market for CFA 10 schools x 500 students = 5000 students. To get a better
overview of where the schools are located, I pinpointed their locations on a map:
Figure 1: CFA target market
These schools are all partnered with the Bitou10 foundation, which is a local partner of CFA. They
chose to work with the schools partnered with the Bitou10 foundation, because Bitou10 being a local
organization would have more knowledge regarding which school would really need help. These
agency problems are simply better solved by working with a local partner you trust, which is the case
with the Bitou10 foundation. CFA came into contact with the Bitou10 foundation through the
Komatsu Denron community center. Denron community Center is ranked very highly based on the
developmental work they have done in South Africa, which makes them a trustworthy partner as well.
The critical need of the target market is the need for better education. With better education these
students will have the opportunity to make their own future much brighter. How the situation is now
though, this critical need is not being met sufficiently yet. There are low pass rates at matric9 level,
high dropout rates, and overcrowded classrooms just to name a few issues. There are organizations
The National Senior Certificate (NSC) examinations commonly known as “matric” have become an annual
event of major public significance in South Africa. It not only signifies the culmination of twelve years of formal
schooling but the NSC examination is one of the key barometers to indicate the state of health of the education
system. Retrieved from: http://www.education.gov.za/Examinations/tabid/338/Default.aspx
9
23
like the Bitou10 foundation and Komatsu Denron community center who are working hard to alleviate
this problem, but CFA feels that more can be done. They want to start by tackling the digital illiteracy
problem.
As I mentioned in the introduction of this section, it is important for an organization to know its
market well. Therefore I have looked up some general demographics about South Africa, and some
more specific demographics about the Bitou area. This information will help CFA in identifying
opportunities, and tailoring their services better to the characteristics of their market.
Some general demographics about South Africa10;

The population measured in October 2011 was 51,8 million.

GDP increased by 3,1% in 2011

The World Bank ranks South Africa’s economy as upper-middle income, being currently one
of the largest economies on the African continent. Historically, the South African economy
was primarily built on primary and secondary industries, such as mining and manufacturing,
but in recent decades, and in line with global developments, growth has shifted to the tertiary
industries. Presently, industries that contribute to the economy include finance, real estate and
business services; manufacturing; and wholesale and retail trade. This trend shows how
important education is becoming. To find work in the tertiary sector, one has to have a certain
level of education.

The overall level of poverty has declined in South Africa between 2006 and 2011, but it
differs quite largely if looking at specific educational groups in South Africa. Overall it has
been shown in the report of Poverty Trends that more educated people seem to be less
impoverished compared to less educated people in South Africa. This seems to show that
education is possible a roadmap out of poverty, thus giving more weight to the CFA mission.
Some more specific demographic statistics for the Bitou area derived from a census report from 20112;
10

The population in the Bitou area in 2011 was 49.162. About 25, 2 % of these people are
youngsters aged from 0 to 14 years old. Around 68, 4 % is consisting of people in that are in
the working age (15-64). There are about 23.599 people economically active (employed or
unemployed but looking for work), and of these people 30, 1% is unemployed.
Of the 11.929 economically active youth (15-34 years) in the area, 37, 9% are unemployed.
This unemployment can be linked to the tertiary sector becoming more important in South
Africa. Working in this sector requires education at a higher level, which is lacking here.

Of those people aged 20 years and older, 2,4% have no form of schooling at all, 28,2% have
completed matric, and 12,4% have some form of higher education. These are strikingly low
percentages of people that have completed some form of higher education or at least matric.
This underlines the importance of the mission that CFA is pursuing.
Retrieved from: http://beta2.statssa.gov.za/
24

Of the people living in the Bitou area, 87% have a cell phone, 24, 2% have computers, and 77,
9% have a television. About 60, 9% of the people there have no access to internet. Only 14,
2% have access to internet from their home, while the rest access it from their phones, work or
elsewhere. Also important to note is that about 94% of the people there have electricity for
lighting.
4.3.3 Peers to learn from
There are some charities which provide similar services as CFA does or wants to. Using the term
competitors for these charities would not be right, because the organizations are not really competing
against each other. It is better to use the term ‘peers’. As Jennifer Lee (2011) states in her book they
are ‘peers’ from whom we can learn a thing or two. In this section I looked at each individual peer and
tried to answer the following questions:
1. What service(s) do they provide?
2. What are their strong points?
3. What are their weak points?
4. What is their target market?
The charities I investigated here are:





Computers4Africa UK (http://www.computers4africa.org.uk/)
Signorelli Movement (http://www.signorellimovement.org/?portfolio=style-one)
Camara (http://camara.org/)
IT schools Africa (http://www.itschoolsafrica.org/content/view/66/)
IT Donations (http://www.itdonations.nl/)
The reason for selecting these five charities is because they provide services and/or products which are
closely related to CFA. To see the whole competitive analysis, please refer to the appendix.
4.3.4 Obstacle course
As every other organization, CFA also has to deal with some challenges. One of the biggest issues for
CFA now is finding sponsors and getting funding for the activities they want to undertake. At the
moment CFA is depending on too few partners for their income stream or sponsoring. If one of these
sponsors were to opt away, then they might fall into financial trouble due to which they would not be
able to continue with their activities. To gain more continuity in the organization, it is important to
have a diverse portfolio of income streams. More details on this are provided in the ‘Financial plan’.
A second issue that CFA has to deal with, as a pretty newly organized charity, is exposure. Because
they have not been active for too long of a period, gaining exposure is necessary for a number of
reasons. One of those is by being more exposed to the people, it will be more probable that donations
will be made to CFA. More on this issue and how to solve it in the ‘marketing’ section.
The third issue that CFA deals with is how to measure the impact of their activities in South Africa.
By measuring the impact and being able to show specific results, it will be easier to convince more
potential donors to join forces with CFA. Proving impact leads to more donations because people will
know they are donating to a cause that really leads to positive change. CFA itself is surely convinced
of its positive results, but by proving it they can ensure themselves and outsiders of their positive
impact.
25
4.4
Organization and Management
In this section I will highlight who the main players are in the organization of CFA together with their
backgrounds, what tasks they are intended to do, and why they are the ones chosen to do it.
First of all, the chairman and co-founder of CFA is Jef Verschuren. He has completed his master
Economics & Business (specialization in marketing) at the Erasmus University Rotterdam. Currently
he is the manager of Ixxer. Africa. Ixxer is focused on helping firms to identify, use, and stimulate
talent in their organization. His past work experience includes him being the marketing manager at
Erasmus School of Economics. His tasks here were to shape and execute a coherent marketing strategy
of ESE, utilizing a broad spectrum of marketing tools. The marketing was focused mainly on
generating sponsors and subsidies. He has also lived and worked three years in the Bitou area.
At CFA he is in charge of mainly networking, generating exposure, and finding new partners. These
are tasks closely related to the promotion/marketing of CFA. These tasks have been laid upon Jef due
to his former experience as a marketing manager at Erasmus School of Economics and Ixxer, thus
making him the right candidate for this job. His wealth of experience in other areas also, means that he
has a broad network of people he can contact. This will make it easier to come into contact with
potential partners.
Then there is Saskia Krijger, who is co-founder of CFA too and the secretary of the Foundation.
Currently she is the director and owner of Krijger Consult & Coaching. In almost 25 years she has had
the experience of managing many different projects, being an organizational advisor, and belonging to
the interim management of many different organizations, all mainly in the non-profit sector. She has
been a facilitator of group processes, a stimulator of individuals as a writer of strategic policy notes,
project programmes, implementation plans, etc. In the past she has had many similar experiences as,
for example, the head of the Dean’s office and head P&O of Erasmus School of Economics. Here she
had to perform many different management and consulting tasks.
At CFA she is in charge of updating the website, drafting and updating the vision, monitoring the
success of activities and legal aspects. She is fit for this job because of her broad experience in the
field of management and consultancy where she has constantly worked on these activities, and her
knowledge of education, not for profit organizations and knowledge of South Africa. Due to her huge
experience in this field she has the power of forming a vision, and then turning it into reality.
Lastly there is Ben Schootpoort, who is in charge of the financials of CFA. He has an experience of
twenty years as a line- and project manager of public and private organizations. He also has a
background in finance.
At CFA, he is in charge of the financial parts, tries to get extra sponsors, and is responsible for keeping
CFA’s expenses within its budget. He is the right person for this job, because of his background in the
financial sector.
At the moment these are the main players active in the organization of CFA, but in the future more
will join (including someone who will be active in the social media). These will all be volunteering
their work to help CFA progress.
26
4.5
Marketing & Sales
In this section a possible marketing strategy for CFA will be presented. This will consist of three
different strategies; a growth strategy, channels of distribution strategy, and a communication strategy.
4.5.1
Growing up
As an organization, CFA has many different opportunities to grow and improve. One of the biggest
issues for CFA is the collection of old computers and funding. At the moment it is difficult to get a
continuous flow of money and computers for the cause. This issue can be tackled by organizing
fundraisers/appeals in the Netherlands and Belgium for the collection of money and old computers.
Just like the example of Computers4Africa UK, these fundraisers/appeals can be on a quarterly basis,
or they can be based on some other time frame. It is also smart to capitalize on the Hyperactive brands
trend, by making fundraisers more engaging for people. Organize a marathon, a race or some other
challenge with the goal to gather money for the cause. This is also in line with what Camara does.
Another way for CFA to get more continuity in their income stream is by working together with the
‘Give as you live’ initiative. This is a very nice initiative which allows customers to shop online at
their favorite stores, and the stores will then donate some amount/percentage for each dollar/euro
received. The best part about this is that it does not cost the customer anything extra! So they can just
shop as they normally would, and know that they will be contributing to a good cause at the same
time. There are also other crowd funding initiatives available, like the 1%Club, that CFA should
definitely make use of.
Lastly, CFA can gain continuity in their funding by working together with IT Donations from the
Netherlands. This partnership would provide many benefits to CFA. First of all, by joining with IT
Donations, CFA can get money donated by different firms to them and also become part of this huge
network of IT Donations. Secondly, CFA prefers to have big batches of the same computers. This
means that they would prefer to target firms and schools that want to get rid of big batches of the same
computers, and not so much individual consumers that might all have different computers. The benefit
by working with IT Donations then is that these different ICTs can then be given to IT Donations in
exchange for money. This means that CFA can accept donations from anyone in any form (money,
computers, printers, mobile phones, screens etc.). Another benefit by working with IT Donations, is
that they are able to data wipe the computers with a certified Blancco software. This guarantees 100%
safe data removal.
Next to providing only technology to the schools in South Africa, CFA has opportunities to expand
their offered services/products. Computers4Africa UK and Dell both have something like a container
classroom that they provide in African countries. The idea of both is to take excess containers and
convert them into fully working computer classrooms. These will be powered on solar energy, which
is much more efficient for these African schools. CFA can also think of ways on how to provide
container classrooms, because sometimes the schools have the problem of having no space for the
provided ICTs. Considering that CFA is based in the Netherlands, and that Rotterdam port is one of
the biggest ones in the world, they should make use of that. There will be lots of excess containers
which can be reused as container classrooms. These containers can then be installed with the proper
technology, and then be shipped as a whole to Africa. This way the ship will not have to return with
empty containers.
27
Because CFA is providing the schools with ICTs, what they can also think about is to provide online
lesson modules/online classes. Think of an initiative similar to KHAN academy. These online lesson
modules can be made in conjunction with the Bitou10 foundation and Denron community Center,
because they are much better in pinpointing the specific things needed in the software due to their
better knowledge of the locality. These online classes/modules have the benefit of relieving the teacher
of too much children in classrooms. This can allow the teachers to put half of the children in the
computer labs, where they are able to work on their exercises and when they don’t understand
something they can watch a video explaining it. Also, these lesson modules can be made by teachers
which are in some cases better and more certified, than the teachers in South Africa. Thus it might
make understanding of the material much easier for the kids. Think also of something like a
Wikipedia page for schools, to allow the students to get access to a large amount of information. This
can come handy when wanting to research something for the projects that pupils might need to make.
Then there is also the Keepod, which is basically an operating system running from a USB-stick thus
allowing multiple people to use one computer. Each person can then store its own stuff on the Keepod,
which makes them less dependent on the hardware. This allows much more efficient and safer use of
each computer. If the computer were to crash, then the person would still have all its data in the
Keepod. The other main benefit of the Keepod is that a licensed operating system is not necessary for
the computers anymore. No yearly renewals are then needed, because buying the Keepod will be a
onetime investment. CFA should therefore think of ways to work together with the Keepod.
Lastly, it would be a shame if mobile phones were not used as a means for improving education as
well. Considering the immense popularity of mobile phones, many people have some extra’s lying
around. These could also be donated to CFA, and CFA could then use them also for improving
education in these South African schools. Here you could think of revolutionary ways to use mobile
phones in education. But these phones can also simply be exchanged for money at IT Donations. That
money can be used to fund other activities.
Next to only being active to improve the African community, CFA can also think of ways on how to
improve the community in the Netherlands and Belgium at the same time. Computers4Africa UK
works in conjunction with schools, unemployment centers and prisons in the UK, to allow these
people to do some (voluntary) work like refurbishing old computers, packing them etc. This method
can also be applied by CFA in the Netherlands. Working together with high schools can allow many
students the opportunity to maybe have an x-week internship at CFA. Or some students can help with
the refurbishing and packing of the computers, just like the unemployed can do. This gets them active
in the work life again. Prisoners can help in refurbishing computers as well, as part of their obligatory
service they have to provide. Some higher students could possibly help with the ‘train the trainer’
program that CFA wants to start/has started. The idea is that the African teachers also need to be
educated with regard to the ICTs they receive. This education can be given by higher schooled
students.
4.5.2
Distribution
The distribution strategy of CFA is a very simple one, considering they are only active in quite a small
area at the moment. The computers that are shipped from the Netherlands and Belgium are distributed
further by the Bitou10 foundation and/or the Denron community centre. They make sure custom
procedures are met, store the computers safely, inspect and test the computers, load them with Open
source software, issue the computers to selected schools, provide training to the school teachers,
28
provide technical support, and perform follow up audits to ensure the computers are used in
accordance with the objectives of CFA.
4.5.3
Getting the word out
As mentioned in the challenges section, CFA is quite a young organization and still needs to gain more
exposure. There are different ways for doing this, but it is first important to know who exactly it is that
CFA wants to target with their marketing efforts. In this case because it is a charity, the desired
customers are not the ones that also need to be marketed to. As a charity you would want to gain more
exposure and recognition among potential donors. These donors would therefore make up your perfect
customers to which to direct your marketing efforts. Because CFA prefers to have large batches of the
same computers, businesses and schools would be the first group of potential donors that CFA would
market to. Next to in kind donations they can also provide CFA with financial donations. The second
group of interest to CFA is the general public, which can help with small financial donations and in
kind donations of computers.
Knowing which group to target their marketing efforts to, CFA also needs to have some marketing
goals. Obviously CFA wants to increase their exposure and the amount of money and computers
donated, but these are quite broad goals. Some more specific marketing goals could be;
1. Double the amount of computers donated in 3 months
2. Increase Facebook followers to 500 in 3 months
3. Get in 2 newspapers within 3 months
Having identified specific marketing goals that CFA wants to achieve, it is now easier to find out
which media to use to reach these goals. A table is now presented with the specific media chosen, its
main message, the timing, which resources are needed for it, and its estimated expenses.
29
Table 1: Marketing strategies
Marketing
medium
Main message
Timing
Resources needed
Estimated
expenses
Website
General information about the company and its mission, vision
and values.
Monthly updated
Volunteer(s) willing to build the website and
keep it updated.
None
Blog
Give readers a peek behind CFA and the schools in South
Africa.
Bi-Weekly
Volunteering teachers in South Africa, willing
to write blog posts.
None
Founders of CFA and teachers in S-A schools write blog posts.
-Material to write about in the blog, means that
you need to stay up to date. Keep a journal of
activities.
-Planning needed for who needs to write a blog
post and when.
Social media
Keep readers updated about the activities of CFA. Announce
upcoming fundraisers/appeals, show the work of CFA, and
post about other interesting things for our subscribers.
Weekly
Volunteer(s) to keep updating the social media
pages with accurate, timely information.
None
Get featured in
2 (local)
newspaper(s)
Importance of recycling old computers, the positive impact our
old computers can have on African children. People can be
sustainable and help impoverished students at the same time.
Before 1
november
Write a press release
None
(Thinking behind this is that most people buy
their large ICTs in December considering that
there are some huge discounts in that month.
So there will be a higher chance for people to
have older computers which they can donate.
30
These can be sold to IT Donations to buy up
computers in big batches.)
Networking at
specific events
Promoting the cause of CFA by talking with different people at
these events.
Look for specific
dates and times
for when relevant
events take place
Volunteer(s) to look out for relevant events
where our perfect customers will be appearing
(businesses and schools mainly).
None
Public
speaking
Topics interesting to our desired customers and linking to CFA
(sustainability, CSR, environment, education, poverty etc)
Look for specific
dates and times
for when relevant
events take place.
Volunteer(s) to look out for relevant events
where our perfect customers will be appearing
(businesses and schools mainly).
None
Organizing
events
Organize fundraisers that can function as a great promotional
tool, but at the same time also raise money and/or computers.
Fundraisers can be done in many different ways. Think of
connecting a sporting achievement to fundraising, but a simple
night of entertainment (dance/music/dinner) can also be an
effective fundraiser (WAR Child concerts as an example where
everything was sponsored by partners).
2-3 times a year
-Volunteers needed to organize the event
(finding a location, organizing the event,
promoting the event).
Base the
events on
sponsorships
as much as
possible.
-Find guest speaker(s) from one of the many
partners of CFA willing to join or speak at the
event.
CFA can choose to organize events like networking events,
workshops about certain topics etc. Some guest speaker can be
invited from one of the many firms that CFA has a partnership
with. These events can then be opened up for the general
public, with the goal to attract as many people as possible. The
added benefit here is that CFA could ask each person for a
31
small entrance fee, meaning that this event will also help in
generating income.
Events targeted towards firms:
-Networking events
-Workshops regarding CSR, sustainability, ICT and education.
Or using the expertise of the founders of CFA, giving
workshops about organizational management, project
management, marketing etc.
Events targeted towards schools:
-Workshops about being more efficient (teaching planning
skills), preparing for job interviews (how to write a CV, how to
prepare for the interview) etc.
-Organizing sporting events for students.
Approaching
schools in NL
and BE
CFA should personally approach schools in NL and BE, and
inform them of the opportunities they have to help children in
Africa with their old computers. Most of the time the schools
and the students are not aware of these possibilities.
A possibility is to also bring the South African students into
contact with the NL and BE students. This could be done
through a simple Skype session, obviously requiring that both
schools have internet. The South African students can then talk
about the benefits and joy they get by working with the ICTs.
At the same time, CFA can also talk with the schools about the
32
possibilities of student internships in South Africa.
33
4.6
Financial plan
In this section I will provide the three year strategy for CFA, which will highlight where they want to
be after three years and how they can get there. After this a detailed overview will be presented of
each specific result that needs to be achieved to reach the objectives, and each result will be dissected
into the instruments and activities necessary to reach that result. In this overview, the expected cost for
each activity will also be listed which will be important for the projected budget of CFA. A budget
will be presented for the coming three years, where the expected costs will be listed for three different
scenarios. The one difference in each scenario is whether CFA makes use of a licensed operating
system, the Keepod, or a free operating system. These budgets can be found in the appendix. Finally,
there will be an overview listing the current income/funding streams of CFA and possible new ones.
4.6.1
Prove, improve and gain continuity
The three year strategy for CFA consists of Prove, Improve, and gain Continuity. With proving it is
meant that CFA needs to monitor and evaluate their own activities to be able to show, to the outside
world, the impact of their activities. CFA believes their activities lead to positive change, and by
proving it they can convince more potential donors to join their boat.
Improving means that the current technological situation in the non-fee schools in South Africa needs
to be improved. Think of delivering more computers and using them more efficiently, better
educational software, training teachers and students to counter the digital illiteracy issue.
Gaining continuity means that as a particularly young organization, CFA should strive to gain more
continuity in their organization. This means that they need a more diverse income portfolio, like
partnerships, individual donations, grants etc.
As mentioned above, the prove part of the strategy consists of monitoring and evaluating the activities
of CFA. This will provide CFA the opportunity to know what they are doing well, and on what levels
they still need to improve. By knowing what they do well, they can also prove outsiders that their
activities have the positive impact that they expected. By showing the weak points, CFA is being
transparent and it shows the ability to self-criticize. Utilizing these weak points to turn into strong
points, is what CFA then needs to do. All these points should be able to be reviewed in yearly reports
made by CFA. There should be some system of Monitoring and Evaluation that needs to be developed.
The improve part of the plan consists of improving the digital literacy of students in South Africa.
Think here of supplying more computers to the schools, making more efficient use of the computers,
training teachers and students in ICT use and maintenance etc. These are all activities aimed at
increasing the educational effectiveness in these schools. As expected, to realize these activities CFA
will need more funding. This brings us to the next point in the strategy of CFA; gaining continuity.
Gaining continuity is what CFA should strive towards in the upcoming three years. As a particularly
young organization, CFA does not have many different income/funding sources yet. They rely on just
a few partners for sponsoring, plus financial and in kind donations. Next to using different income
sources, which are not being exploited yet, CFA should also strive to strengthen the bonds with their
current partners. Deepening the relationships with their current partners will allow them to create long
term relationships. This will be in the benefit of CFA, allowing them more security of their income
streams, so it is able to guarantee its customers its service(s).
4.6.2
Three year goals of CFA
34
The three year strategy presented in this section was derived in conjunction with CFA (mainly through
Saskia Krijger). In this section each result will be dissected into the instruments and activities needed
to achieve it. Next to that, the expected cost of the activities will also be listed. The overview of these
expected costs can be seen in Table A7 to Table A9.
Main goal
Making primary and secondary school pupils, in a specific area in South Africa where CFA has
reliable local partners, 'digitally literate'.
Prove
*Build a system of monitoring and evaluation
*Provide yearly monitoring and evaluation reports
Improve
*Have 10 schools in the Bitou area fully equipped with ICT's and have them replaced at the end of
their life cycle
*Have all PC's that are provided loaded with educational software
*Have trained 20 teachers in different schools in ICT usage and maintenance
*Have 25 South African students trained in ICT use and maintenance that can be used on the schools
that are provided with the ICTs
Gaining continuity
* Have a backup source(through financial donation or in-kind donation) for each part of the process:
collecting computers, refurbishing computers, distributing computers to South Africa, distibuting
computers within South Africa, teaching ICT use and maintenance to the teachers and students,
recycling computers and replacing computers.
These results are dissected into the instruments and activities needed to achieve that particular result,
and this can be seen in the next tables.
35
Result:
Have 10 schools in the Bitou area fully equipped with ICT’s (5000 ICT’s) and have them replaced at the end of their life.
Instruments:
-Partnership with IT Donations
-Partnership with Bitou 10 foundation
- Old, refurbished computers from the Netherlands & Belgium
-Software licenses
-Recycling partner(s)
-ADSL
-Recycling process in working order
Table 2: First result; activities and costs
Activities
*Collecting old ICTs
Convince more partners to donate to CFA (through networking and/or
marketing)
Organize appeals/fundraisers (to get ICTs from general public and/or money).
Think of tying a fundraiser to some sporting events, or possibly a night of
entertainment (a concert, a dinner, some performers).
Get into a formal partnership with IT Donations to pick up the computers from
the donating partners(if there are big batches) / stimulate donating partners to
bequest the money to CFA
*Refurbishing old ICTs
Get into a formal partnership with IT Donations to refurbish the old ICTs
(data wipe them, and load them with operating software)
Getting a software license for all the computers. It would be best if this could
be received for free. There are free operating systems available out there
(Freespire, PC-BSD, Haiku etc.). Another very good alternative to this is the
Keepod, which basically is an operating system running from a USB stick!
As can be seen in the projected cost tables in this section, the Keepod is more
cost efficient than the licensed software. Also, the Keepod is a onetime
Expected cost
Cost=€0
Organizing one fundraisers/appeals per year= €2000
Organizing two fundraisers/appeals per year €2000 * 2 = €4000
Cost=€0; Sponsored by IT Donations
Cost=€0; Sponsored by IT Donations / the firms that donate to IT Donations
Option 1: Licensed operating system Cost= €1500 per school
For 10 schools; 10 x €1500 = €15.000
This will be €15.000 a year at the end of three years, because the license
needs to be renewed each year. Assuming CFA serves three schools in year
one and two, and the remaining four schools in year four, the cost in year
one will be 3 x €1500, in year two 6 x €1500, and in year three it will be 10
x €1500.
36
investment instead of yearly renewals of a license.
Option 2: Free operating system Cost=€0
Issue is to make sure the educational software runs on the free software.
Option 3: Keepod Cost=$7 per stick
This has the benefit that it will not have to be renewed each year. Total cost
for the 5000 students of 10 schools; 5000 * $7 = $35.000
This is a one-time cost ( without considering the renewal cost if one breaks)
*Distributing the refurbished ICTs;
Convince schools, prisons, unemployment centers to voluntarily help with the
making ready of the ICTs for shipment
Have at least 2 partners for shipping or paying for the shipment of the ICTs
from the Netherlands & Belgium to South Africa
Convince some transporting or post company to take up the transport of the
ICTs when in South Africa, to the corresponding schools (Also possible to talk
with them about the possibility of them taking op the whole distribution chain.
Collecting in Netherlands, shipping to South Africa, and transporting to the
schools)
*Providing the schools with ADSL
Convince firms to provide ADSL connections for free
Cost=€0
Cost for repairing pc's and shipping them per container = €3000. Assuming
CFA sends two containers a year, this will lead to €6000 costs per year.
Cost for repairing pc's and shipping them per container will then be €0,
because it will hopefully be fully sponsored by DHL. Packaging and
refurbishing might cost some money.
Cost of ADSL for one school for one year= €1200 per year
So by the end of year 3, this will amount to 10 x 1200=€12.000 a year just
for ADSL connections for the ten schools. Assume to provide three schools
with ADSL in the first two years, and in the last year it will be the
remaining four schools. So the cost of ADSL will be 3 x 1200 in year one,
then 6 x 1200 in year two and finally 10 x 1200 in year three. Possible firms
that CFA can approach in South Africa: Afrihost, Cybersmart, Webafrica.
*Provide schools with supporting services/products if necessary
Think of computer classrooms, smart boards, furniture, tablets, laptops, and
security (physical and digital) for this technology.
Classroom with furniture=€25.000
Smart board per item=€900
AVG antivirus=€0
37
*Recycling
Convince E-Wasa to join forces with CFA for the recycling of computers at
the end of their life (http://www.ewasa.org). Also try to work with Just PC’s
(http://justpcs.co.za/) that also provide eco-friendly e-waste disposal. Next to
that, they also provide services like buying redundant IT equipment at market
prices. Having them as a partner means that computers collected in South
Africa, can be sold to Just PC’s at market related prices. This money can then
be used to buy big batches of similar computers, just as CFA does in the
Netherlands with the help of IT Donations.
Cost=€0
38
Result:
Have all PC's that are provided, loaded with educational software, in English and for certain courses in Afrikaans.
Instruments:
-Partnership with E-learning for kids
-Partnership with KHAN academy
-Partnership with RACHEL
-Digital library for kids
Table 3: Second result; activities and costs
Activities
Convince E-learning for kids to provide educational software for the South
African schools in the Bitou area, in their own language preferably. They could
work together with the Bitou10 foundation and Denron community to realize
this.
Convince KHAN academy to provide online lesson modules for the curriculum
in South Africa for the different levels (primary level, high schools level) Also,
preferably in the African language. They could also work with Bitou10 and
Denron to realize this. The issue could be that many schools do not have access
to internet yet, making it hard to access the KHAN academy.
The lack of ADSL in many schools, which prevents them access to online
educational sources, can be tackled by working with RACHEL11. RACHEL
provides offline educational resources to areas where internet availability is
limited. Convince RACHEL and KHAN academy to provide educational
resources in English and in the African language.
11
Expected cost
This educational software is provided for free by E-learning for kids in the
English language. There still needs to be software in the African language
though.
Cost=€0; Sponsored by KHAN academy
Cost=€0; Hopefully provided to us with no costs, being sponsored fully by
KHAN academy and/or RACHEL.
Can be found at: http://rachel.worldpossible.org/about.html
39
Result:
Have train the trainer concept in working order and first 20 certificates handed out to trained teachers
Instrument:
-Train the trainers concept
This concept is where students of South Africa, Netherlands and Belgium teach the teachers on how to install, maintain and use ICT (software and hardware)
Table 4: Third result; activities and costs
Activities
*Convince schools in Netherlands, Belgium and SA with specific excellent
ICT students, to give them study points for a 6 month internship where they
learn more and practice what they learn. The students are expected to:
-Train the teachers
-Be available for technical help when needed
-Setup knowledge sharing platform for the schools
-Make course material for self-study for future teachers and students, to learn
how to work with the ICTs
Expected cost
An IT trainer for one month for the 'train the teacher' program costs €3000. If
we make use of internships and students that teach the teachers, then we can
save considerably on this cost (Possibly for free if ‘Born in Africa’ provides
their guest houses for residence and transports the interns to the schools. In
many cases volunteers pay money to help in different countries.)
They may need money to be able to setup the knowledge sharing platform
between schools, which costs €5000.
These students will then receive study points, certification or anything of the
sort to acknowledge their experience and their work.
40
Result:
Have 25 South African school students trained in ICT use and maintenance.
Instrument:
-Scholarships for these students to allow them to be trained in ICT usage and maintenance.
-Teachers training students
- Job skill certificates
Table 5: Fourth result; activities and costs
Activities
Training these students in ICT use and maintenance. This will mainly be
done by the Komatsu Denron community Center. At the end of their course
they get a certificate showing their knowledge in this field.
Expected cost
Scholarship for one student = €2000
So training all 25 students by the end of three years will cost in total 25 x
2000 = €50.000
Assume to train eight students in year one and two, and then the remaining
nine students in year three. This means that the cost in year one and two will
be 8 x €2000, and in year three the cost will be 9 x €2000.
41
Result:
Have a back-up source (through financial donation or in-kind donation) for each part of the process.
Instruments:
-Partners sponsoring activities
-Fundraising for money
-Appeals for ICTs
-Give as you live
-Selling CFA merchandise
-Applying for grants
-Partners supplying computers
Table 6: Fifth result; activities and costs
Activities
Get in contact with more firms that can provide possible sponsoring for
CFA’s activities and/or provide it with ICTs directly. Think of IT Donations.
By connecting with them CFA gets access to a larger part of their network.
Expected cost
Cost=€0
Organize fundraisers and appeals in the Netherlands and Belgium, to gather
money and computers. Have maybe a fundraiser activity two times a year,
and make it into a fun event.
Organized two times a year which amounts to €4000
Register CFA with 'give as you live'12 and the ‘1%Club’13
Cost=€0
Apply for grants at different trust funds?
Cost=€0
Deepen relationships with current partners.
Cost=€0
12
13
Source: http://www.giveasyoulive.com/
Source: https://onepercentclub.com
42
Result:
Show clearly each year what progress is made, and what is still left to do.
Instruments:
-Facebook
-Website
-Annual monitoring and evaluation reports
Table 7: Sixth result; activities and costs
Activities
Pay working visits
Keep track of progress, write reports about what still needs to be done, make
pictures of the progress. All this can be posted on Facebook and on the
website.
Expected cost
One working visit = €3000 (especially airline tickets that cost much)
Costs more time than money.
43
4.6.3
Generating income
There are multiple ways in which CFA can generate income to fund all their activities. They have
partnerships with firms that help them in differing degrees14.
Friends of
Friends of CFA are organisations in especially the Netherlands and Belgium that help the foundation
by donating their surplus computers (PC, laptops and tablets) for re-use at non-fee schools in South
Africa.
Current friends: EUR, IT Equipment, ESAA, Reclassering Nederland, ISO, ISM company.
CFA expects that this number will grow due to the partnership with IT Donations.
Service partners
Service partners help CFA on a day-to-day basis. These partners can be located in the Netherlands,
Belgium and South Africa. They know and understand the local situation and give their services for
free. CFA has partners in the transport and distributing process, in the web design and support
services, in the preparation of the local infrastructure, in training projects for the teachers and other
users.
Current service partners: Bitou 10, Denron Community Center, Komatsu, Rethinking group, Triton
shipping, Born in Africa, IT Donations.
More service partners are needed for the distribution process. Think of Post NL, DHL, or other similar
firms that are willing to provide their services for free.
Supporting partners
The supporting partners help the foundation by providing financial or in kind donations (including
expertise) and project adoptions (think of an education fund, a school that sends ICT interns,
institutions in South Africa donating software or helping with the realisation of the train the teacher
concept, etc.)
What CFA is missing is the support of the general public. There is a lot of potential in the general
public that they could make use of, and there are many different ways to make use of it:
Give as you live / crowd funding
This initiative allows people to shop at their favorite online shop, while the shop will then donate an xamount to a charity. The best part about this is that it does not cost the customers anything extra! Other
crowd funding initiatives are also available, like the 1&Club, and CFA should definitely make use of
that.
Fundraisers/appeals
As Computers4Africa UK also does, CFA should organize fundraisers/appeals in the Netherlands and
Belgium. First of all this can increase exposure of CFA. Secondly, this can be targeted more
14
This information was acquired through private communication with Saskia Krijger.
44
specifically for the general public where they also have some money or old ICTs that they would like
to donate. By making these fundraisers into some fun event, this will increase the attractiveness.
Voluntary work
People can also help with the refurbishment of the computers, some administrative tasks, or other
tasks that need to be done. There are many people willing to spend their free time for a charity
organization, and these people should certainly be included in the picture of CFA.
CFA merchandise
Not to be underestimated, selling CFA related merchandise can also be quite effective. It helps in
getting in more money, but at the same time it is an effective marketing tool. Think of CFA t-shirts,
pens, etc. Another option is to organize something like networking events for people that support the
charity. They can have monthly networking events where they can come in contact with people from
other firms and other walks of life. To attend this networking event one would have to pay for a ticket
of which the proceeds go directly to CFA. Think also of using the expertise of the founders of CFA for
giving workshops (marketing, project and organizational management, entrepreneurship). People
wanting to attend that workshop will have to pay for a ticket of which the proceeds will be fully used
by CFA.
45
5.
Discussion
In this section I will provide a discussion of the literature linked to the actions of CFA. In the literature
review I saw that there were several barriers to the effective implementation of ICTs in developing
countries. The goal here is to see how CFA tries to/can overcome these barriers. Also, I will discuss
possible limitations of some elements of the business plan like the results that CFA wants to achieve.
5.1
Overcoming barriers
In the literature review several barriers were mentioned to the effective implementation of ICTs in
developing countries. I will shortly state the barriers here again, together with how CFA can/does
overcome them.
1. Lack of resources and supporting infrastructure
This means that developing countries often lack resources like updated hardware and software,
printers and scanners, a continuous electricity supply and working internet connections.
The hardware that is provided by CFA (computers, tablets, laptops) is collected in the Netherlands and
Belgium and is refurbished before they are given to the schools. To not have hardware that is too old,
they have set the criteria of not accepting equipment that is more than 6 years old. These ICTs are then
loaded with the relevant operating system, and educational software. There are three options for using
an operating system, which consist of the licensed one, a free one, and the one of the Keepod. If CFA
uses the licensed operating system then automatic updates will be applied, while the free operating
system could require some manual updates. Lastly, the Keepod runs on Android 4.4 which is already
up to date, and it is one of the most popular mobile OS at the moment. The educational software for
these schools is provided by E-learning for kids. They continuously update their programs, and add
new programs to the collection.
Internet connectivity can be beneficial in many ways, because so much more information becomes
available. However, connectivity to the internet is still an issue for the schools in South Africa because
not all schools have access to it. This can be tackled by actively looking for partners willing to sponsor
the ADSL connections, or other types of internet connections for these schools. By lacking an internet
connection, students get devoid of a large source of information. Another way to tackle this problem
then is to find offline resources that provide educational information. That is why a good option for
CFA is to work with RACHEL, which is an offline educational server. Many different educational
sources are provided on that website, and these can be accessed even without an internet connection.
2. Lack of funding
Many schools in developing countries opt out of ICT usage because they simply do not have the
money for it.
CFA solves the issue of funding, by providing the ICTs to these schools in return for a small financial
donation (25 rand) and mainly an in-kind donation. This means that the beneficiaries need to organize
some project for the welfare of their community (AIDS awareness project, computer lessons for the
community etc.) in return for the ICTs. This makes the technology very affordable for these schools.
46
3. Social and cultural factors
There are social and cultural factors that also hinder the effective implementation of ICTs in
developing countries. For example, education and ICT skills are not considered to be important for
women in most of these countries. Also, people lack educational skills because much of the
educational software provided is in English or some other foreign language. Lastly, the people also
simply lack the education and the ICT skills to work effectively with the provided ICTs.
CFA tackles these problems in different ways. They try to stimulate their partner, E-learning for kids,
to provide educational software in the African language. If there are future partnerships with KHAN
academy, then optimally those online lesson modules should also be in the African language. To
tackle the lack of ICT skills of people, the Bitou10 foundation provides the opportunity for community
members to engage in ICT skills training. These trainings could be given by the teachers or students of
the schools that have undergone an ICT skills course. These courses could be given by these schools
as a form of in-kind donation in return for the computers provided by CFA. By helping people to
become more educated in South Africa, eventually they will realize the importance of women being
educated as well. On a longer term the actions of CFA will therefore lead to more women in education
and more women using ICTs.
4. Corruption
In developing countries, there is a larger possibility of corruption taking place. This simply means that
provided resources are misused.
To tackle corruption, which is a possibility in these countries, CFA is working with local partners who
are ranked highly on developmental work. Also, they aim to continuously audit whether the computers
are being used in the schools for their intended purposes. Continuous monitoring and evaluation are
helpful for CFA to identify whether their activities have the intended impact, and they can also help in
identifying a possible source of corruption if there is any. By doing these continuous evaluations, and
working with trustworthy local partners, the issue of corruption is minimized.
5. Attitudes and beliefs of teachers and teachers lacking time to build up ICT knowledge and skill
If teachers are not positive about ICT use, they will not use it. They may be negative about it simply
because they have no experience and the skill to use the ICT. Also, in some cases they might want to
improve their ICT skills but do not get sufficient time to do so.
CFA tackles this issue by providing teachers training in ICT usage and maintenance. This will be
provided by interns through the ‘train the trainer’ program. This is a program where students of South
Africa, Netherlands and Belgium teach the teachers on how to install, maintain and use ICT (software
and hardware). To tackle the lack of time these teachers have, CFA makes it a requirement that a
certain amount of teachers of the beneficiary school follow the ICT skills course. If this requirement is
not fulfilled, then the computers will not be provided to the school.
5.2
Limitations & Challenges
The results that CFA wants to achieve in the upcoming three years have been listed in the business
plan. How realistic are they? What risks are associated with these results and how can CFA deal with
them?
47
As a charitable organization, CFA should definitely monitor and evaluate the impact of their activities.
By doing this, they will get to know their own strengths and weaknesses. There is not yet a clear
system of monitoring and evaluation that CFA has, but they can start with simple activities. They can
request feedback regarding their own activities from the South African teachers, students, and local
partners. This will require more time than money. However timely it will be though, this is essential
information for CFA to know. By getting to know their own strengths and weaknesses, they will be
able to improve as an organization. The results of these evaluations can be posted on their social media
networks, on their website, and they can make separate reports of it for each year. Monitoring and
evaluating is therefore not too much of an issue for CFA.
Looking at the ‘Improve’ goals, it seems that they might contain some goals that are difficult to
achieve in three years. Equipment can be a possible issue, considering that ten schools need to be fully
equipped with ICTs by the end of three years. Recycling of ICTs that have exceeded their lifetime is
something which needs to be arranged. Finally, replacement of ICTs is also necessary for the schools
to be able to continue their activities with the help of ICT.
Equipment of ten schools in the Bitou area with ICTs is quite difficult to achieve. Especially when
considering the fact that CFA has been able to supply 500 computers since the start of their
organization (+/- 3 years)15. If they want to achieve their goal of having fully supplied all ten schools
with computers by the end of three years, then that means they will have to supply a 4500 computers
more in three years (500 students per school x 10 = 5000 students). This amounts to a striking 1500
computers that need to be supplied each year. In other words, CFA will need to fully equip three
schools each year with computers. Even though CFA will do more marketing in the coming time this
still seems like an unrealistic task, when considering that CFA has been able to supply approximately
500 computers in the last three years. Recycling is another possible issue, because computers that have
exceeded their lifetime need to be recycled. They will not simply be thrown out to be part of the
landfill. Therefore, CFA needs find a recycling partner, preferably in South Africa. E-Wasa is a
possible partner that CFA can join forces with in South Africa. Just PC’s is also a possible partner
which provides more services than only eco-friendly e-waste removal, which can be helpful for other
activities of CFA. Lastly, after the computers have exceeded their lifetime, CFA should provide these
schools with replacement computers.
The risk in this case is that CFA may not be able to get enough in kind, or financial donations to be
able to supply this large amount of computers. Being able to provide a few computers for these
schools can help enormously already. Therefore, equipping each pupil with one computer is a goal that
may be too ambitious and not necessary after all. Especially when using the Keepod, which makes
computer sharing much more effective. Instead of fully equipping each and every pupil of the 10
schools that CFA is working with, their goal should be to provide a ‘sufficient’ amount of computers
to these schools. Next to that these computers need to have the educational software, timely repair and
timely replacement.
Providing educational software for all the ICTs seems like a reasonable result to achieve. Especially
when considering the fact that CFA has stimulated a partnership between the Bitou10 foundation and
E-learning for Kids. A possible issue that could come up here is that the educational software may not
be able to be provided in the African language. It would be optimal to have educational software in the
15
Private communication with Saskia Krijger. Part of the information can also be found here
http://www.bitou10foundation.co.za/news/e-learning-for-bitou-children/
48
language or dialect of that specific area, but this severely limits the usability of the software to only
these areas. Same issue could come up if CFA partners up with KHAN academy. KHAN academy
provides online lesson modules in the English language, so providing this in the African language can
be a problem. The risk here then would be that software in the African language may not be able to be
provided by E-learning for Kids and/or KHAN academy. To deal with this risk, CFA has two options.
They can search for another partner that makes educational software available in the African language.
Or, they can help in providing more English classes in the area they are active in. In this way the
students will be better equipped in English, and will be able to use the English educational software.
Training 20 teachers and 25 students in ICT use and maintenance is another result CFA aims for in the
upcoming three years. Training the teachers is supposed to be done through the ‘Train the trainer’
program, which still needs to be set up. To be able to bring this concept to life, schools in the
Netherlands and Belgium will need to be convinced of its effectiveness and be willing to provide their
students the opportunity of an internship at CFA. This means that these schools will have to combine
these internships into their curriculum, so these students get some form of study related incentives to
complete the internship properly. If schools would be willing to do this, then they would have to
change their curriculum to allow for this internship. The schools will also have to donate some money
to keep this concept alive to pay for the costs of the internship. Not all schools would be willing to
change their curriculum, and not many schools will have the necessary financing for these student
internships. The risk then is that students of Netherlands and Belgium would not be willing to do or
cannot do internships in South Africa, which means that the ‘Train the trainer’ program will not be set
up as planned. If this is the case then CFA should find other ways of educating the teachers in South
Africa in ICT use and maintenance. The other viable option then would be for the Komatsu Denron
Community to educate these teachers, considering that they already educate students in ICT use and
maintenance. What is also possible, and easier, is for South African students that are knowledgeable in
ICT usage and maintenance to train the teachers. They can set up the ‘Train the trainer’ program
without the help of students from the Netherlands en Belgium.
Training the South African students will mainly be done by the Komatsu Denron Community Center,
because they can provide proper courses in ICT use and maintenance. These courses can also be
improved with the help of the interns for the ‘Train the Trainer’ program. At the end of their course
these students will receive some sort of recognition for their gained knowledge in the form of a
certificate. To allow students to do this course, they have to receive a scholarship. This could be a
problem that ties back to the one main issue of CFA: getting funding.
CFA has partners that provide financial support in the form of money or sponsorships, and there are
also partners that provide in kind donations (for more details see the financial plan). However, by only
relying on these partners at the moment, it is very difficult for CFA to achieve their goals. Therefore
CFA needs to gain more continuity. Their new partnership with IT donations does show some
potential, because IT donations has access to a large network of firms which can provide more support
to CFA. To support the whole organization, and to spread out the risks, CFA will have to gain more
streams of income/in kind donations. This will allow CFA to gain the much needed continuity in their
organization, which will provide much more certainty to the schools in Africa and the future potential
donors of CFA
49
6.
Conclusion
The purpose of this research was to see how CFA can have an impact on the economic
development of the area they are active in. The way to investigate this was through the help of a
literature review, whereby recent literature (<20 years) about the impact of ICT on the economic
development of developing countries was examined. The focus was on the direct impact of ICT and
the indirect impact of ICT on education, on the economic development of developing countries.
For developed countries it is clear that most of the literature seems to point to a positive correlation
between ICT and economic development. For developing countries however, there seem to be mixed
results found in the different studies. Overall what can be seen in both the direct impact of ICT and its
indirect impact on education is that ICT does seem to have potential for impacting economic
development positively, but this has to go along with investments in other complementary areas. ICTcomplements are necessary to make ICT have a positive impact on the economic performance of
developing countries. When talking about ICT-complements one can think of supporting
infrastructure, knowledge and skills of the workforce and teachers, developed telecommunications
sector and more. In most case developed countries are much more developed in these complementary
areas, which is why they reap more benefits of ICT investments. In contrast to developing countries
who are lagging in the ICT area and the ICT-complements area.
Also important for the indirect impact of ICT on education is that there seem to be barriers, listed in
the literature, for the effective implementation of ICT in the educational sector in developing
countries. If CFA aims to be effective in their work, they need to overcome these barriers. The barriers
considered are lack of resources and supporting infrastructure, lack of funding, social and cultural
factors, corruption, attitudes and beliefs of teachers, and time for teachers to learn the necessary ICT
skills.
To overcome the lack of resources and supporting infrastructure, CFA provides computers, tablets,
and laptops. But next to that, they also try to provide schools with an internet connection, and with
online and/or offline educational resources. The lack of funding is tackled by the fact that CFA
provides their ICTs and services to the beneficiary schools in return for a small donation of 25 rand,
and mainly an in kind donation. This means that the beneficiary school(s) need(s) to organize some
project for the benefit of their own community. This makes the ICTs affordable for these schools.
When talking about social and cultural factors that hinder the effective implementation, you could
think of education and ICT not being considered to be important for women in these countries. Think
also of the people lacking educational skills due to much of the educational software being provided in
English or some other foreign language. Lastly, think also of the fact that people in these areas simply
lack the education and ICT skills to be able to work effectively with the provided ICTs. CFA tries to
overcome these obstacles by stimulating E-learning for kids to provide African educational software ,
and by stimulating the Bitou10 foundation to provide the opportunity for community members to
engage in ICT skills training. By educating people in these under developed areas, eventually they will
then realize the importance that ICT and education have for women as well. Corruption is a very
relevant problem, especially in developing countries. Continuous monitoring and evaluation are
helpful for CFA to identify whether their activities have the intended impact, and they can also help in
identifying a possible source of corruption if there is any. By doing these continuous evaluations, and
working with trustworthy local partners (Bitou10 foundation, Komatsu Denron Community Center),
the issue of corruption is minimized. Lastly, improving the attitudes and beliefs of teachers regarding
ICT is also a necessary barrier that needs to be overcome. CFA tackles this issue by providing teachers
50
training in ICT usage and maintenance provided by interns through the ‘train the trainer’ program. To
tackle the lack of time these teachers have, CFA makes it a requirement that a certain amount of
teachers of the beneficiary school follow the ICT skills course. If this requirement is not fulfilled, then
the computers will not be provided to the school.
The business plan’s main purpose is to provide focus for CFA and their activities. Therefore a strategy
has also been listed in this plan, where results have been specified that need to be achieved in the
upcoming three years. These results have been specified in conjunction with CFA. There are certain
limitations of these results though, that CFA has to be aware of. First of all, the equipment, recycling
and replacement of computers can be a possible issue for CFA. Fully equipping ten schools with ICTs
by the end of three years is a daunting task, when considering that CFA has been able to supply 500
computers in the, approximately, three years they have been active in. Next to that, they need to find a
recycling partner willing to recycle the ICTs at the end of their lifetime, and they need to arrange
replacement computers. Secondly, providing educational software does not present any problems as of
yet, because of the partnership that CFA stimulated between the Bitou10 foundation and E-learning
for kids. However, the possible issue that could arise is the fact that the educational software may not
be made available in the African language. Thirdly, educating South African teachers and students in
ICT use and maintenance is expected to be done by interns from the Netherlands, Belgium and South
Africa. The risk in this case could be that schools in the Netherlands and Belgium would not be
willing to/are not able to provide interns for this program. This means that CFA needs to find other
options for educating the teachers and students. Lastly, the biggest limitation of CFA is that it does not
yet have the continuity that is needed as an organization. Due to the fact that they are a relatively new
organization, they still need to broaden and diversify their income/donation portfolio. Having these
resources will enable them to get closer to achieving their expected results.
All in all, CFA does have the opportunity to positively impact the economic development of the Bitou
area. They aim to do this by positively impacting educational development. To do that they need to
overcome certain barriers, which for a large part consist of investing in lacking ICT complements, for
the effective implementation of ICT in education. Even though the organization is ambitious in their
results, they should consider how realistic their results are. Especially as a relatively young
organization they have to deal with the issue of gaining more exposure to diversify and grow their
income portfolio (monetary and in kind donations). As a charitable organization they rely on support
from others, and the more support they get the better they will be in ‘Proving, Improving, and Gaining
Continuity
51
7.
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54
Appendix
1. Competitive analysis
Table A1:What service(s) are provided?
1. Collect, refurbish(data wipe and
load with operating software) and
distribute old ICTs
2. Provide educational software
3. Provide teacher and/or student
training in ICT use and maintenance
4. Provide technical support for
beneficiary schools
5. Recycle computers at the end of
their lifetime
Computers4Africa
Yes
Signorelli movement
Unknown
IT schools Africa
Yes
Camara
Yes
IT donations
Yes
Yes
Unknown
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Unknown
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Unknown
Yes
Yes
No
55
Table A2: Computers4Africa S&W
Computers4Africa
Strong points
-Good Website
-Active on social media
-Have experience in many different countries
-Merged with digital pipeline, allowing them to use their expertise as well
-Make use of radio(BBC) as a marketing tool as well
-They donate 10% of the computers they send out
-They run appeals on a quarterly basis throughout UK to collect ICTs and money
-Clearly stated what amount leads to which specific action (5 pound = usb stick, 10
pound=surge protector, etc.)
-Provide teacher training in ICT use and maintenance
-Provide container classrooms
- They use Blancco software for data wiping, which guarantees 100% safe and secure
data removal.
-Clear instructions on what type of equipment they accept
- They are certified as being Carbon Neutral(measures how green you are as an
organization) with their activities.
-Recycle computers at the end of their lifetime
Weak points
-Hard to provide quality to one specific area, because
they are active in many different areas.
-Beneficiaries of the computers have to pay a
contribution regarding the preparation and shipping
cost of the equipment, which is luckily at the best
price available in their locality.
56
Table A3: Signorelli Movement S&W
Signorelli
movement
Strong points
-To fund their activities in Malawi, they sell t-shirts (smart to use this income stream
instead of only donations or sponsorships)
-Beneficiaries do not have to pay any fees for the equipment and/or services received.
-Provide teacher training in ICT use and maintenance
Weak points
-Their biggest weak point is that they lack clarity and
transparency about their CFA project. Hard to find
information on their website about it. Cannot find
what amount leads to what action, who will provide
maintenance to the computers, if they work together
with some partners, where in Malawi they work,
what schools they have helped and many more
questions like this that are unanswered.
Table A4: IT schools Africa S&W
IT schools Africa
Strong points
-Good website
-Active on social media
-Have a lot of experience (active since 2004)
-Work with ‘Give as you live’. More information about this in the financials section
-Work with local UK community (prisons, unemployment centres, and schools) for the
refurbishment of computers. Thereby also leaving a positive impact in the UK.
-Provide teacher training in ICT use and maintenance
-Recycle computers at the end of their lifetime
-Guarantee complete data wiping according to US defence standards
Weak points
The schools pay a proportion of the costs involved in
refurbishing and shipping the computers.
Wellicht: zeer versnipperd waar ze actief zijn in
Africa
57
Table A5: IT donations S&W
IT Donations
Strong points
-Good website
-Active on social media
-They have a famous Dutch person, on the homepage on a video that talks about IT
donations. Good marketing tool.
-They are working with HP against the ALS disease.
-They pick up the old computers from firms, saving firms the transportation costs.
-They use Blancco software for data wiping, which guarantees 100% safe and secure
data removal.
-They can also come on location and data wipe the ICTs, if for example the ICTs cannot
yet leave the firm due to firm sensitive information on them.
-Next to obvious ICTs such as computers, laptops and tablets, they also collect printers,
telephones, modems, and much more.
Weak points
58
Table A6: Camara S&W
Camara
Strong points
-Good website
-Active on social media
-Have a clear strategic plan. They know where they want to be, and how to get there:
http://camara.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/CamaraStrategy2014-2016-1.pdf
Weak points
-Beneficiaries need to pay some cost for receiving the
computers.
-They work with their ‘proven model of education delivery’ which is also scalable.
-Are experienced, because they have been active for many years.
-Provide very clear overview of what they are actually doing in the countries they are
active in and how they do it. For example they also provide pdf’s of the courses they
provide to the teachers in Africa, on their own website.
-Powerful partnerships with companies like Dell, Google, Intel etc.
-Audited reports and annual reports on their website
-Provide internships at Camara.
-Camara has received multiple awards for their work.
-They provide monitoring and evaluation reports with the goal of analyzing data
provided by the African students and teachers. They encourage the teachers and students
to be as critical as possible regarding the services and products provided by Camara. All
this is done with the goal to improve the work they do, by knowing how to adjust where
necessary. The latest report has been of 2011.
-Work together with KHAN academy/RACHEL to deliver large amounts of educational
information to remote areas.
-All of the educational software, and other resources are free to be shared with anyone
over the world.
-Have made Wikipedia pages focused on schools.
-They see South Africa as a possible new education hub. Possibility for CFA to join
forces with them.
59
Figure A1: Target market of our peers
Red=
Yellow=
Green=
Blue=
Computers4Africa
Signorelli movement
Camara
IT schools Africa
60
2. Projected costs
Table A7: Projected cost(in €) with a licensed OS
Year 1
Fundraising/Appeals
OS license
Distribution/Shipping
ADSL
Supporting services
Knowledge sharing platform
Students trained in ICT use and
maintenance
Working visits
Marketing costs
Unplanned costs
Total
Year 2
Year 3
4.000
4.500
6.000
3.600
10.000
1.667
4.000
9.000
6.000
7.200
10.000
1.667
4.000
15.000
6.000
12.000
10.000
1.667
16.000
3.000
100
1.000
49.867
16.000
3.000
100
1.000
57.967
18.000
3.000
100
1.000
70.767
Table A8: Projected cost(in €) with free OS
Year 1
Fundraising/Appeals
Free OS
Distribution/Shipping
ADSL
Supporting services
Knowledge sharing platform
Students trained in ICT use and
maintenance
Working visits
Marketing costs
Unplanned costs
Total
Year 2
Year 3
4.000
6.000
3.600
10.000
1.667
4.000
6.000
7.200
10.000
1.667
4.000
6.000
12.000
10.000
1.667
16.000
3.000
100
1.000
45.367
16.000
3.000
100
1.000
48.967
18.000
3.000
100
1.000
55.767
61
Table A9: Projected cost(in €) with Keepod
Year 1
Fundraising/Appeals
Keepod
Distribution/Shipping
ADSL
Supporting services
Knowledge sharing platform
Students trained in ICT use and
maintenance
Working visits
Marketing costs
Unplanned costs
Total
Year 2
Year 3
4.000
9.167
6.000
3.600
10.000
1.667
4.000
9.167
6.000
7.200
10.000
1.667
4.000
9.167
6.000
12.000
10.000
1.667
16.000
3.000
100
1.000
54.533
16.000
3.000
100
1.000
58.133
18.000
3.000
100
1.000
64.933
62