“Meaningful community-centred connectivity” is a project under the Local Networks (LocNet) initiative, a collective effort led by APC and Rhizomatica in partnership with people and organisations in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean. It aims to directly support community networks and other community-centred connectivity initiatives, while contributing to an enabling ecosystem for their emergence and growth. This initiative is carried out with the support of the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland acting through the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO). It is part of a multi-year multi-donor strategy envisaged to address the human capacity and sustainability challenges, along with the policy and regulatory obstacles, that limit the growth of community-centred connectivity initiatives.
This project aims to contribute to our vision of digital inclusion: Rural, remote and marginalised communities have the opportunities, capacities and resources to achieve and shape meaningful community-centred connectivity that contributes to the strengthening of local well-being, economics and cultures.
The project will focus on coordinating country-level as well as regional-level efforts around the provision of access through activities set out by support organisations and communities in Africa, Asia and Latin America to strengthen their impact, reach and sustainability. Specifically, the project will achieve its objectives of enabling, shaping and seeding community-centred connectivity through targeted activities such as national-level training and accompaniment of communities. The project will also advance subgrants to provide access to local services, digital technologies and the internet, build on knowledge production activities and resources, ensure gender sensitisation, and contribute globally and regionally to the development of an enabling policy and regulatory environment.
The LocNet initiative will continue to contribute to changing the narrative and demonstrating that civil society and local communities are suitable and capable partners in bridging the digital divide, bringing connectivity, inclusion and ultimately improved quality of life to previously excluded persons in the global South.
The project will adopt human rights-based and gender equality approaches, with a special emphasis on women-led initiatives and integration of a gender perspective at all levels of project conceptualisation, planning and implementation. In addition, an ecosystem approach that integrates participation and ownership of project participants will be used to ensure sustainability beyond the life of the project.
More information about the Local Networks (LocNet) initiative can be found here.
Photo: Daniela Bello
