What the numbers say: The success of Diplo’s EU/ACP project

The i’s have been dotted and the t’s have been crossed and Diplo’s EU/ACP project has officially closed. The Capacity Building Programme and Community Development in Internet Governance and ICT Policy for Intra-ACP regional and sub-regional institutions has been successfully completed. It was a major project for Diplo, involving numberous activities, and partners from four continents. Now that the reporting has been completed, it’s time to reflect on the successes of this 24-month project and to take a quick look behind the numbers.

• 506 beneficiaries from 60 ACP countries took part in various activities during the 24-month implementation period.
• 309 beneficiaries (501 participants) successfully completed the online courses in Internet Governance and Policy, ICT Policy and Strategic Planning, Training for Tutors, Policy research methodology and policy writing.
• Regional and gender distribution of beneficiaries:

• 26 beneficiaries from the Pacific (11 women, 15 men)
• 66 beneficiaries from the Caribbean (33 women, 33 men)
• 217 beneficiaries from Africa (72 women, 145 men)

• 501 online course participants made 22,972 hypertext entries (a tool that allows participants to anchor comments, arguments, questions, and other text directly to sections in the lecture texts), posted 3593 blogs, and made 2635 contributions to the community forums.
• 53 ACP countries were represented in the online Internet Governance and Policy course.

Perhaps one of the most lasting outcomes was the publication of 23 papers on relevant IG and ICT policy in March 2011. The work by the authors introduced a fresh breeze of thought into the already well-mapped thematic field of IG and enabled the localisation of ACP-focused Internet governance challenges and a better understanding of national or regional specificities. Some research papers were written in French, to reflect the local needs identified by their authors. The abstracts of the papers were printed in a Book of Abstracts publication and the full text is available.