Policy Issues in the United Kingdom An ICT policy in the UK

The European Unions ICT policy

The eEurope action plan 2002

The eEurope action plan 2002 became the European unions major iniatiative to make all of its member countries take full advantage of an “information society for all”. The main priority of this action plan policy is too bring Europe online as fast as possible which would mean encouraging the use of the internet by making it cheaper, faster and more secure for its users. The motivation behind this plan was that it is believed that digital technologies have become key factors in creating economic growth and employment. Other aims of the eEurope action plan is to encourage E commerce activities in member countries and to provide government information online so that public services become electronic making it more convinient for the general public, this in turn would mean no more traditional ques.

As part of the plan the internet will become part of every childs education meaning that children from as young as 6 will become familiar with the internet, this is part of the elearning initive in Europe. The Internet is gradually becoming cheaper to use because of the increased competition between regional networks. The increased competition has lowered the prices all round Europe and means more internet access for the public. The eEurope action plan also encourages students and researchers from different countries in Europe to share and collaborate their work. This will be achieved through the development of a new iniative called “the world wide grid” which will assist collaboration

Recomnedations and ICT policy guidelines which are use to a

governmnet in a low income economy

The previous policy critiques that I have examined primarily focus on buliding an internet future for a country or organisation because many developed countries see the internet as very socially and economically productive. However for a low income economy  government policy should be more focused on more people having access to a PC to gain vital keyboard skills rather than making the Internet the main focus. Having access to the Internet would come afterwards once the people of a low income country became computer literate because it is no good making the internet accessible to everyone because some poel may not have the skills to use it in the first place, therefore computer litracy would be one my main policies in low income country. The govrenmnet in a low income country could set up community centres open to the public for access to PCs meaning that nay member of the public could drop in and use them. These centres could act as learning environments for individuals where people could use the internet and could also be taught how to operate a PC and how to use the internet in such centers. This would be economically and socially prosperous because this would lead to a more literate (skilled) workforce therefore encouraging more multinational companies to invest a country because having a skilled workforce attracts big companies. The people could also receive better quality of life due to the gaining more skills which would mean better job prospects. Another policy would be to encourage mobile phone use by encouraging competition between different mobile phone companies. The more competition that there is in the market  the cheaper the prices or tariffs become therefore encouraging more people to purchase mobile phones. Mobile phones have shown to be socially very important and therefore wil increase a persons social presence. Also the more people that use a mobile phone the better it si for the economy of a country because more jobs are created for the increased demand in phones and the increased consumer expenditure creates further revenue for the economy. In low income countries more emphasis should also be focused on providing online working environments for students which would enable distance learning. E learning would be very impiortant to a low econmoy country because in poorer countries schools are sometimes hundreds of miles away and sometimes class  sizes are too large. Instead of travelling to their traditional schools which could be miles away the could access their academicwork through IT education centres