Our blog is where you'll find all our project updates, highlights and achievements, as well as other news and events related to iMENTORS
This is the new iMETORS banner on the Gov2u homepage:
Have you used the iMENTORS opendata service and would like to share the news on your homepage?
Contact us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
iMENTORS has opened its data to all unregistered usersin its last six months of operation. It is important that donors provide information about the aid they give. More important though is for the information to be publicly available in a way that people can easily understand. iMENTORS (www.imentors.eu) is the most comprehensive data map on ICT investments in Africa and contains data across a multitude of entities, classified as organisations, research infrastructures, fibre networks and projects.
Making information about aid spending easier to access, use and understand
iMENTORS has opened its data to all unregistered users in its last six months of operation. It is important that donors provide information about the aid they give. More important though is for the information to be publicly available in a way that people can easily understand. iMENTORS (www.imentors.eu) is the most comprehensive data map on ICT investments in Africa and contains data across a multitude of entities, classified as organisations, research infrastructures, fibre networks and projects.
Louis Papaemmanuel, Project Director of iMENTORS, SU, will present iMENTORS at the IST-Africa Conference during Session 8d: eInfrastructures (Thursday, May 08, 2014). He will explain how using iMENTORS and open aid data enhances the coherence of international aid. IST-Africa 2014 is taking place in Mauritius (06 - 09 May) and is the ninth in an annual series of Ministerial Level Technology Research Conferences.
iMENTORS (www.imentors.eu) is an interactive resource, the first of its kind, to contain information about all known e-infrastructures in Africa in the past five years. Launched for public use and input in July 2013 iMENTORS provides you with the necessary tool to visualise e-infrastructures and all related projects in Africa.
Africa as a region and as individual countries, is slowly making a steady progress towards establishing national and Regional Research and Educational Networks (RRENs). Although still in its infancy compared to other world regions such as Europe where each country has an active National Research and Educational Networks (NRENs) with established regional networks such as TERENA, iMENTORS database provides evidence for tremendous progress over the past few years.
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Africa as a region and as individual countries, is slowly making a steady progress towards establishing national and Regional Research and Educational Networks (RRENs). Although still in its infancy compared to other world regions such as Europe where each country has an active National Research and Educational Networks (NRENs) with established regional networks such as TERENA, iMENTORS database provides evidence for tremendous progress over the past few years.
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
There are currently three RRENs in Africa namely; West and Central African Research and Education Network (WACREN), Ubuntu Alliance which consists of Eastern and Southern African countries, and the North African block which belongs to Arab States Research and Education Network (ASREN).
Overal, iMENTORS has mapped 23 individual NRENs, 13 of which are members of Ubuntu Alliance, 6 WACREN members and 4 ASREN members. Check out our map!
A paper presenting iMENTORS tool for analysis of contextual factors will be presented at the World Conference on Information Systems and Technologies (WorldCIST) under the "Intelligent and Decision Support Systems" section, on the 15th April 2014 at Madeira Island, Portugal and will be published by Springer in a book of Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing series.
The paper is titled "Quantitative scenario-based assessment of contextual factors for ICT4D projects: Design And Implementation in a web based tool", written by iMENTORS team members: Anton Talantsev, Aron Larsson, Florence Nameere Kivunike, David Sundgren.
Image courtesy of sheelamohan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
iMENTORS is mapping terrestrial networks in Sub-Saharan Africa. The goal is to identify areas on the map underserved by network operators and providers. These areas also represent good opportunities for governments and the private sector to invest in e-infrastructure projects.
Image courtesy of ddpavumba / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
The dawn of the final launch of a new and comprehensive database on einfrastructures across Africa is steadily approaching. After a successful initial round of data extraction and recording, the iMENTORS team has now embarked on the validation of the information, in addition to further data collection regarding any infrastructures that are not yet recorded in the system.
Image courtesy of Victor Habbick / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
The latest addition to the iMENTORS database is the Connect 4 Change project. Connect 4 Change is a consortium of five Dutch development and ICT organizations collaborating to accelerate the realization of the Millennium Development Goals through the use of ICT. The program supports ICT initiatives in the areas of education, health and agricultural and economic development, and members of the consortium have funded nearly sixty different ICT projects in Africa. The consortium works with local partners in many different countries, including Burkino Faso, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia.
Image courtesy of cooldesign at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Louis Papaemmanuel, Director of the iMENTORS project was invited to speak at the Headquarters of the African Union in Addis Ababa, in the framework of the AUC Internet/ICT Week held on Dec. 2-6 2013. The week is part of a series of events organised to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the formation of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) / African Union (AU).
Image courtesy of Kookkai_nak at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
iMENTORS version three went live today and is one step closer to mapping the majority of e-infrastructure (resources, tools and data supporting community research and development) of the past five years in Sub-Saharan Africa in order to lay a foundation for better services, encourage research and connect cross-continental progress. The aim of iMENTORS is to help scientists, universities, research and education networks as well as policy-makers and international funders to gain valuable insights on the gaps and progress made in the region and to identify synergies when planning future ICT initiatives within the African continent.
iMENTORS is hosting a workshop with the e-infrastructure stakeholders in Africa, to collect input and encourage the crowdsourcing efforts and participation on the platform.
Image courtesy of Ambro at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
This edition of the 'Africa-EU Cooperation Forum on ICT' (Dec. 2-3, 2013) is held in the framework of the AUC Internet/ICT Week and is taking place this week in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
iMENTORS’ Research Infrastructures (RIs) database is the first centralised portal of all high level research facilities and information sources in Africa or hosted elsewhere but focusing on Africa.
Image courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Research infrastructures refers to any facilities, resources or related services that are used or could be used by the scientific community to conduct top level research in their various disciplines. We are currently gathering all accessible information regarding RIs in Africa and would like your support. If you have any relevant information, please contact iMentors to help create an exhaustive database. Better still, you can update the database yourself at www.imentors.eu
iMENTORS has identified and recorded 58 submarine cables into and out of the African continent. This amounts to over 450,000 km of cable, and over 150 different organizations involved in the funding and operation of the cables.
The challenge now for Africa is to develop local fiber optic networks to connect these from high-capacity international submarine cables all the way to the home.
Image courtesy of jscreationzs at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
You 've got....mail!
The iMENTORS e- newsletter keeps you abreast of any new project developments and relevant topics.
Like it and want to subscribe? Click here
The collection of data for the iMENTORS database is currently focused on donor databases and international submarine cable networks.
Nearly 2000 organizations involved in ICT projects are already mapped and recorded in the iMENTORS database which launched the beta version in July. Users can easily sign in using their LinkedIn credentials, put their projects on the map and increase their project’s visibility. The aim is for the platform to contain 80 percent of e-infrastructure projects/investment frameworks by the end of the project using an advanced geographic information and visualization system.
iMENTORS (also funded under FP7) has been busy recording the IST-Africa project and related FP7 projects. iMENTORS enables organizations to connect with each other, share resources and link their ICT4D project proposal to the past or on-going projects.
IST-Africa, a project coordinated by the International Management Commission (IIMC) of Ireland, brings together the national ministries or government agencies in 18 African countries responsible for information and communications technology (ICT) or science, technology and innovation (STI) research and policy.
This past week, iMENTORS (also funded under FP7) has been busy recording the IST-Africa project and related FP7 projects.
Image courtesy of jscreationzs at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
According to an article published on Quartz, a group of Belgian researchers has come up with a novel way (pdf) of mapping the distribution of wealth in Côte d’Ivoire—by looking at purchases of mobile airtime minutes.
This project has received funding from the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no 313203