The pervasion of information and communications technology across the Maldivian society has had a dramatic impact on governance and policy making in the country, says His Excellency Mr. Ahmed Sareer, Permanent Representative of the Maldives to the United Nations. Mobile subscriptions in the Maldives stand at a staggering total of over 560,000 in a population of about 350,000. While 38 per cent of the population uses Internet, the usage of social media is pervasive and significantly higher than most developing countries, with almost all Internet users having Facebook accounts. The Ambassador made the statement while chairing a segment at the 14th Infopoverty World Conference, held at the sidelines of the 47th Session of the Commission on Population and Development.
Ambassador Sareer said that because of ICT growth, traditional media in the country is now directly affected by and often integrated with new media. “Facebook and twitter consistently break stories before media outlets, which are then left scrambling to put together the facts of a story”, he noted. Information sharing has reached a new height in the Maldives, from being able to communicate the latest Government initiatives to hearing of the hardships of the passage of Bills at the Parliament. As a result, the public has become “more informed and become more empowered”, said Ambassador Sareer. The youth had strongly engaged with politicians, and their high enthusiasm shown in the recent elections was mainly due to the massive campaign held within social media, he said.
Even in economic sectors, poor safety in the workplaces is now exposed and accidents due to negligence receive immediate national attention. As a result, the most remote island communities have a voice today, and “in times of crisis the vulnerable are rallied to by the general populous.” Though the Maldives use the most sustainable method of pole and line fishing, overfishing and climate change pose major challenges, and therefore to compensate, the Government has facilitated the use of GPS fish finders to minimize the global impacts on the industry. Because an average school in the Maldives has 300 students, some having less than 50, the country has had to adapt by exploring new methods of teaching as well as training the teachers. The Government is presently in the process of implementing multi-grade classrooms, where students not only perform well as their single-grade peers, but also acquire better social and interpersonal skills.
The Infopoverty World Conference was born in 2001 in the wake of the proclamation of the Millennium Development Goals. Over the years, the Conference has addressed the employment of ICT for fighting poverty, discussing best practices and the deployment of development strategies in various countries and within the United Nations system.
