The Finnish government has signed a deal with SA that will see it donate 12 million euros (R136 million) to SA in ICT development aid over a three-year period.
The deal, signed by SA's communications minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri and Finland's minister counsellor Marjaana Sall, in Pretoria yesterday, is in support of the SA Provincial Information Society Strategy programme.
The initiative aims to accelerate social and economic development through ICT, says the Department of Communications.
The funds will be used to connect provincial government facilities to targeted post offices and Thusong Centres, in the Limpopo and Northern Province, to enable communities to access e-government services, it says.
It will also see previously barren post offices in under-serviced areas kitted out with ICT infrastructure, and Thusong centres being updated and renovated, it says.
In addition to the funding, an ICT development counsellor, based at the Finnish Embassy, will engage SA's government to assist in any way possible with the roll-out of the ICT infrastructure programme, says Sall.
"SA has a very special place in our development aid agency and SA is the only country in the world we have such a big agreement within this [ICT] portfolio."
Close cooperation
Matsepe-Casaburri says the Finnish government joins the project at a crucial time, as its assistance will help accelerate the uptake and use of ICT in provinces.
Ministerial spokesman Joe Makhafola notes that the project will also require coordination across government departments at national and provincial level.
"If we roll-out ICT infrastructure in a target region, we will need the Department of Trade and Industry to be there, so young people can access business opportunities, and Home Affairs needs to be there, to provide IDs and other services," he says.
At the end of 2006, government established a structure that is responsible for the implementation of national ICT policy and legislation in provinces, and to align all its ICT activities across its departments and at national, provincial and local levels.
The forum, formed in line with the Information Society and Development Inter-Governmental Relations Framework Act of 2005, is made up of 22 permanent members. It is chaired by Matsepe-Casaburri, with deputy minister of communications Roy Padayachie as deputy chairman.
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