Information Communication Technology for Development

For more than 30 years, USAID has applied information and communications technology (ICT) to development.  Below are a few of the programs USAID is implementing with ICT. 

Global Broadband and Innovations Program (GBI)

In the fall of 2010, USAID launched the Global Broadband and Innovations (GBI) program aimed at addressing a wide-array of telecom related topics within the context of the USAID development agenda. The major focus of the GBI program centers on extending mobile and broadband access into rural communities. Given the large number of rural localities worldwide, this may well be the only viable approach for delivering value-added services for years to come.

ICT & Green Power

The potential for combining clean energy with ICT is an important leveraging opportunity for rural development, and it is a current focus that the GBI program is pursuing in several countries at a demonstration level.

Rural ICT Build-Out Through New Technologies

In recent years there has been explosive growth in the global subscription rate for mobile services. However, estimates are that there remains a gap in affordable coverage somewhere on the order of 1.0-1.5 billion potential subscribers. Of these, the overwhelming proportion  live in rural communities. Fortunately this situation is beginning to change, with the introduction of new technologies.

Universal Service and Access Funds    

Increasingly, developing countries are creating state-managed funds that encourage the expansion of telecommunications access to remoted and underserved areas. USAID works to strengthen the capacity of such funds in Sub-Saharan Africa, and around the world, to deal with the complex challenges they face.

FACET (Fostering Agricultural Competitiveness Employing Information Communications Technologies)

Designed to be interactive and collaborative, FACET provides technical assistance to improve competitiveness and productivity across agriculture sub-sectors through the use of ICTs as tools to enhance the functioning and competitiveness of agricultural value chains and facilitate trade in agricultural products across Sub-Saharan Africa.The FACET Project provides briefing papers, profiles, and events to help USAID agriculture development projects find ways to use ICT in sustainable and scalable ways to increase their success. 

The mFarmer Initiative

The mFarmer Initiative was launched in 2011 in partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. It exists to support mobile service providers, in partnership with public and private sector agriculture organisations, to utilise the mobile channel to extend the reach and improve the quality of information and advisory services for smallholder farmers in emerging markets.