In 2015, I posted a 4-part blog series called “Illuminative Ilocos” which went on to appear on the website of the travel agency who organized our tour. In it, they credited me as a “Travel & Lifestyle Blogger”, even though at that point, I only had 15 odd blogs to my name. From that time on, I identified as a part-time blogger and secretly nurtured the dream of transitioning to a full-time writing career.
Later that year, I resigned from my teaching job, moved to Dubai, and took an entry-level secretarial job. The work was mediocre at best, but it gave me enough freedom to seek out UAE-based websites who could feature my blogs, drive traffic to my personal blog site, and grow my local readership. Blogging was my proverbial golden ticket, and I proved to be right; less than 2 years and a much stronger blog portfolio later, I landed my first full-time copywriting job.
Blogs are powerful catalysts of growth. This perspective is deeply rooted in my own personal experience with blogging; however, this doesn’t only apply to blogging in isolation but also to Information Communication Technology (ICT) as a whole.
“ICT is the collective term given to the new (second and third) generation of information technology spawned by the merger of computers and telecommunications… It encompasses computer systems and networks, cellular telephony, desktop publishing, multimedia production, the Internet, cable television, and others. Another feature of ICT is the convergence of media” (Ongkiko & Flor, 1998) in which “old” media (radio, TV, print) come together with “new” media (digital and social media) in a common platform.
“One way to define the new media and their associated technologies is to contrast them to the old media. Voithofer (2005) specifically contrasts the new media with old media counterparts by describing the ‘newness’ of the new media in terms of changes in production due to convergence of technology and media, storage (digitization and indexing), presentation (in a video display of sorts), and distribution over telecommunication networks” (Friedman & Friedman, 2008).
Because of new media’s “newness”, it is still heavily reliant on infrastructure to support its dissemination. Lack of infrastructural developments, as is the case in many parts of ASEAN Member Nations, directly impacts the effectiveness of new media, even “in a world where ICT has become pervasive” (Introna, 2009).
In 2011, >78% of ASEAN citizens used ICT in various facets of their lives (AIM 2015). The figures remain largely unchanged over a decade later; the internet penetration rate is >70% in all countries except for Laos, Myanmar, and Timor-Leste (Statista Research Department, 2022). This means that the inequality in infrastructural developments we see in the Philippines is not only a national reality, but also a regional one. As a consequence, the ASEAN region is faced with a gnawing digital divide, with mobile penetration rates ranging between 1% and 138% in 2008 (AIM 2015).
On a positive note, what the ASEAN lacks for infrastructural developments it makes up for with its human capital. “With a population of approximately 500 million (11.7 million of which were already employed in the ICT sector as early as 2011), ASEAN is able to offer human capital which translates into a sizeable market” (AIM 2015).
Out of a consultation with key stakeholders (industry, users, and government agencies) came forth the ASEAN ICT Masterplan 2015 (AIM 2015), “the articulation of a single shared vision driven by 6 strategic thrusts to deliver 4 key outcomes”. Its Vision is for ICT to be “a key enabler for ASEAN’s social and economic integration. By developing next generation ICT infrastructure and skilled human capital, promoting content and innovative industries, as well as establishing an enabling policy and regulatory environment, ICT will help ASEAN to transform into a single market. In doing so, ASEAN will empower its communities and advance its status as an inclusive and vibrant ICT hub, making ASEAN an ideal region for economic activities” (AIM 2015). This is a radical shift for a region whose economy has always been primarily based in agriculture.
Nevertheless, if ASEAN hopes to remain competitive in the third major era of humanity, the Information Age, it needs to collectively transform into a single ICT-based market, driven by the Masterplan’s 6 strategic thrusts: Economic transformation, People empowerment and engagement, Innovation, Infrastructure development, Human capital development, and Bridging the digital divide.
It comes as no surprise that since then, ASEAN ICT progress has come in varying degrees of success, from most successful to least successful. For example, among the four Research Outputs in “Linking Research to Practice”, only the Lo O bamboo planting initiative in “Integrating Digital and Human Data Sources for Environmental Planning and Climate Change Adaptation: From Research to Practice in Central Vietnam” may be categorized as “most successful”. On the opposite end of the spectrum, the mobile health education initiative in “The Challenge of Working Across Contexts and Domains: Mobile Health Education in Rural Cambodia” may be considered the “least successful”. And somewhere within the spectrum lies the mostly successful academic internet use in “The Dynamics and Challenges of Academic Internet Use Amongst Cambodian University Students” and the less successful political blogs in “It’s the Talk, not the Tech: What Governments Should Know About Blogging and Social Media” (see Figure 1).
Most Successful: Lo O Bamboo Planting Initiative in Vietnam
In “Integrating Digital and Human Data Sources for Environmental Planning and Climate Change Adaptation: From Research to Practice in Central Vietnam”, Pham Huu Ty et. al. reported an ICT4D initiative which integrated local and external data sources – geographical, economic, political, and agricultural – in order to provide guidance on environmental planning. They proposed the need for “a re-engineering of environmental planning processes,” and that instead of traditional environmental planning practices that simply use ICTs “to automate existing top-down, scientific processes of decision making”, a bottom-up and participatory approach needed to be adopted. They concluded that the “input of local data and the participation of local people was a key necessity in achieving both the accuracy and the ownership of the final plan [Lo O Bamboo Planting],” alongside the introduction of digital technologies (Pham et. al. in Chib & Harris, 2012).
Mostly Successful: Academic Internet Use in Cambodia
In “The Dynamics and Challenges of Academic Internet Use Amongst Cambodian University Students,” Chivoin Peou et. al. reported the findings from a research project which examined how Cambodian university students utilized the Internet for general and academic purposes. While 90% of the students had experience of using internet for academic purposes, “there [were] also threats that demand[ed] attention, including the underutilization of the Internet for improving learning experiences among the students and the gender-based digital divide.” Nevertheless, the researchers found that students were intent on seeking alternative means to access the internet (i.e. internet shops in the absence of PCs at home or limited PCs at universities), which led them to conclude that “future investments in ICT for education initiatives in Cambodia might be ensured of steady technological uptake by their intended recipients” (Peou et. al. in Chib & Harris, 2012).
Less Successful: Political Blogs and Social Media in the Philippines
In “It’s the Talk, not the Tech: What Governments Should Know About Blogging and Social Media”, Mary Grace P. Mirandilla-Santos examined an emerging governance approach in the Philippines, wherein most government agencies (including the late Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr. during his presidency) used various social media. She recognized the potential use of blogs and other social media in facilitating political information and communication and effecting social change. However, she also noted “the Philippines’ long history of closed-door policy-making, bureaucratic processes, and elitist decision-making tempers the promise of social media in transforming governance and politics.” She concluded that “political blogs have yet to create a tangible macro-impact on how Filipinos participate in politics, considering that the contribution of blogs is concentrated in information-sharing to a small, niche audience” (Mirandilla-Santos in Chib & Harris, 2012).
Least Successful: Mobile Health Education in Cambodia
In “The Challenge of Working Across Contexts and Domains: Mobile Health Education in Rural Cambodia,” John Traxler argued the need for emergent ICT4D researchers to work with the wider research community, rather than in isolation. He drew his observations while working with a team at the Royal University of Phnom Penh on a mobile sexual and reproductive health education project in Rural Khmer. This led him to conclude that “projects not based within a robust and mature research culture but nevertheless attempting to build research potential and to foster emergent researchers, are deeply problematic” (Traxler in Chib & Harris, 2012).
Indeed, “ICT is an ongoing, changing field and hence development is enormous,” as stated in last year’s “ASEAN ICT Masterplan 2020 Final Review.” As the title suggests, it published a final review of the ASEAN ICT Masterplan 2020 (AIM 2020) for the period of 2016-2020. Among its 9 key recommendations, “Be more focused and prioritize” stood out as the most relevant, given the context of the 4 abovementioned Research Outputs from Arul Chib and Roger Harris’ “Linking Research to Practice”.
“Be more focused and prioritize. It may be useful to define a smaller number of action points if insufficient resources are available to fully execute a large number of items – as was the case for the AIM 2020. It may be preferable to complete a smaller number of action items and ensure that published outputs are associated with all of them. This point is essentially about defining prioritisation” (AIM 2020 Final Review).
Given the wide spectrum of work required to establish ASEAN as an inclusive and vibrant ICT hub, prioritization is imperative to realize the Vision of AIM 2015 and AIM 2020 respectively. Back in 2011, “the top three priorities of the ASEAN ICT Masterplan [2015] were economic transformation, infrastructure development, and bridging the digital divide,” each with their own set of action points.
Infrastructure Development
Infrastructure development is critical to sustainable ICT development; without it, the entire Masterplan stands to fall like a house of cards. “The challenge is to provide rural populations ICT services and applications at an affordable rate in order to boost penetration levels” (AIM 2015).
Infrastructure development should not only be limited to urban “Centers” but also the rural “Peripheries”, to borrow the terms from Immanuel Wallerstein.
Economic Transformation
Economic transformation is a natural consequence of infrastructure development. To be sure, it is desirable to “create a conducive business environment to attract and promote trade, investment, and entrepreneurship in the ICT sector… that transforms other sectors of the economy” (AIM 2015). Nevertheless, economic transformation should only be secondary to infrastructure development whose purpose should be to improve the ASEAN people’s quality of lives first and line the pockets of their governments second.
Bridging the Digital Divide
Bridging the digital divide is also an important challenge to address, but not an immediate one. Similar to economic transformation, it is but a natural consequence of infrastructure development. It stands to reason that ASEAN will only succeed in addressing “the varying levels of ICT development and adoption within individual countries and across the region” (AIM 2015), if it adopts an infrastructure development plan that encompasses both urban “Centers” and rural “Peripheries” as equally as possible.
Note: This essay was originally written for my postgraduate class in Communication and Media in the ASEAN Context (DEVC 242/ASEAN 231).
- ASEAN Secretariat. (2021). ASEAN ICT Masterplan 2020 (AIM 2020) Final Review. Jakarta.
- Chib, A., & Harris, R. (2012). Linking research to practice: Strengthening ICT for Development Research Capacity in Asia. Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.
- Friedman, L. & Friedman, H. (2008). The New Media Technologies: Overview and Research Framework. SSRN Electronic Journal. 10.2139/ssrn.1116771.
- Introna, Lucas. (2009). Making sense of ICT, new media, and ethics. The Oxford Handbook of Information and Communication Technologies. 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199548798.003.0013.
- Ongkiko, I. V. C., & Flor, A. G. (1998). Introduction to Development Communication. UP Open University.
- Internet usage in Southeast Asia: Statistics & Facts. Statista Research Department. (2022, March 14). Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://www.statista.com/topics/9093/internet-usage-in-southeast-asia/#topicHeader__wrapper
