Evaluating the relevance of indicators for the assessment of ICT4D Initiatives

iMENTORS is a project designed to map the entire e-infrastructure landscape of Sub-Saharan Africa. It is a project co-funded by the European Commission, DG CONNECT, under the 7th Framework Programme, carried out by the Department of Computer and System Sciences of Stockholm University, in tandem with the non-governmental organisation GOV2U.


By mapping e-infrastructure initiatives, our aim is to help scientists, universities, research and education networks as well as policy-makers and international donors gain valuable insights on the gaps and progress made in the region and to enhance the coordination of international actors involved in ICT initiatives in this part of the world.

iMENTORS will be equipped with advanced Geographic Information and Visualisation Systems along with a robust decision-support system drawing public data from many online databases to provide policy support and assist programme planning and implementation.


The aim of the present questionnaire is to gather valuable stakeholder feedback to define the most appropriate criteria in evaluating e-infrastructure projects. By filling out this survey, you will help us build a critical component of our decision-support system.


For more on the iMENTORS project, please visit our official website. For questions or inquiries, please contact us at [email protected].


Thank you for your time, your contribution is very important to us.

Guidelines

The Criteria consists of a set of indicators for the evaluating the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) contribution to social and economic development. The purpose of these indicators is to facilitate evidence-based decision making regarding the selection and implementation of e-infrastructures as well as ICT for development (ICT4D) projects e.g. e-government, e-health, e-learning etc.

This is to be achieved through both post hoc and ex post evaluation of ICT4D projects and proposals against the proposed set of indicators. The proposed set is generic and envisaged to be adapted to context depending on the project being assessed or who the assessor is. The purpose of this survey is to establish the relevance of indicators in terms of whether they are appropriate or suitable for the assessment of beneficiaries' social and economic development. Respondents to this survey are the subject area experts, donors or implementers involved in the design and implementation of ICT4D initiatives e.g. iMentors’ stakeholder advisory board.

The indicators are based on a hierarchical structure consisting of social and economic dimensions, outcomes and then outcome and opportunities or output indicators. Outputs are the direct changes that people can do or be with ICT and consist of new communication patterns, access to information, performing interactions, and transactions. Outcomes are the direct benefits, the achievements that result from the outputs. The survey consists of unstructured as well as structured questions to ensure that a wide range of relevant aspects have been covered. The unstructured questions seek to establish what stakeholders perceive as important aspects in the assessment of the ICT contribution to social and economic development as well as any indicators that could have been ignored.

The structured question consists of a list of indicators and a 6-point likert scale to assess each of the indicators. Respondents will be required to specify on a scale of 0-5 how appropriate the indicator is for the assessment of the respective social and economical development dimension as defined below:

  • 0 = n/a (not applicable)
  • 1 = strongly inappropriate
  • 2 = somewhat inappropriate
  • 3 = undecided
  • 4 = somewhat appropriate
  • 5 = strongly appropriate

 
There are 39 questions in this survey.