Is privatization the best option to sustained telecentres?

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Permalink Reply by Evans MACHERA on April 4, 2009 at 8:56am

This is the era of information-period.That is to say,you and i can't be left behind or else we can't catch up.
And to catch up,information ( telecenters ) are inevitable in the rural areas.I Believe most telecenters are managed by CBOs and all of them need finances to keep them going.

Even though i haven't managed one,i am organising for one where i will order Local Daily Newspapers for the community to read from where they can pay something small daily to read the papers among other materials for information.

A photo-copy machine and public phone can make something small for sustainable hence privatisation is not a bad thing,unless there is a better option.
All telecenters will encourage the culture of reading leading to an informed community.

Thanking you all,

Evans MACHERA.

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Permalink Reply by Masahudu M. Marhey on April 4, 2009 at 10:18am

Hello Evans,

Thank you for your reply to my discussion. keep them coming!

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Permalink Reply by Wangchuk Chungyalpa on April 9, 2009 at 8:29am

Generally speaking privatizations results in more efficient business management. If we look at all the large economies in the world, at some point, the governments had to privatize certain sectors and that has led to tremendous changes within the sector/industry at a rapid pace. Privatization results in efficient business management out of necessity. Unlike public enterprises, private enterprise is based on profitability. Unless the enterprise is able to attain their profitability mark, they will cease to exist. As a direct result, private enterprises are more prone to innovate, are performance oriented, provide better quality services and products, and have in built organizational processes to support these objectives and practices. For example, higher salary for skilled workers, greater transparency, better on the job training facilities etc.

One of the biggest criticism of private enterprises is that they are too profit centered. Usually private center’s charge the market rate based on the demand and supply for their product or service. Whereas public enterprises are normally either free or charge a negligible fee for similar services albeit much poorer quality. This is what differentiates government funded telecentres from private cybercafés.

For a telecentre to sustain itself without government funding and purely on services and products that they offer is highly challenging. The profitability margins are generally much lower. This topic of sustenance is highly relevant to telecentre operators. I invite you to join our discussion on the same topic –SUCCEEDING WITH TELECENTRE – COMMERCIAL SUCCESS WITH TELECENTRE. The primary aim of the discussion is to identify the strengths and weaknesses of a telecentre and to identify those products and services that can be offered by telecentres that are value based providing good financial returns.

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Permalink Reply by A.K.M Ganiul Zadid (জাদীদ) on April 9, 2009 at 4:20pm

Dear Mr Wangchuk Chungyalpa,
Would you please share the link of the discussion topic "SUCCEEDING WITH TELECENTRE – COMMERCIAL SUCCESS WITH TELECENTRE:

I also think this also another important issue for the developing countries..

Thanks all.

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Permalink Reply by Wangchuk Chungyalpa on April 10, 2009 at 8:37am

Hi Zadid,

the link to the discussion :

http://www.telecentre.org/forum/topics/succeeding-with-telecentre

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Permalink Reply by Shahid Uddin Akbar on April 9, 2009 at 8:59pm

Like many other countries, in Bangladesh, we have experienced different model of telecentres in different names. considering the service basket, telecentre is now becoming a 'concept' rather than a physical set up. Due to the technologocal evolution, now one can avail wide range of services from alternate sources instead of visiting telecentres. For example, a farmer need an information on disease about his produces and he can avail the advisory service by using mobile phone, in Bangladesh already this service is available and becoming popular. And farmers have to pay for the service as the services are being developed and offered by private companies. Some citizen information are available in the net and anyone can get access to those info without paying anything except the 'acceess fee'. It appears from last couple of decades that only the private sector can lead and scale up the telecentre movement, may be in a different format. And obviously, government has a strong role to bring the public services at peoples doorstep.

So, now a days, it is becoming less important discussion whether telecentres should be established by private sector or NGOs.

Thank you.
Shahid Uddun Akbar
www.biid.org.bd

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