The Remote IT Village Project and Internet Learning Centers in Laos.

Vorasone Denkayaphitchith

The Remote IT Village is a computer and communications project. The project involves development and field-testing of a custom-designed, solid-state computer linking the villages via 802.11b wireless connection. We are creating a system for communicating words and data. We designed to the exacting specifications of villagers. We are providing computers and a way to get onto the internet in villages that have no electricity nor telephones nor cell phone possibilities because of terrain. In five villages, we are placing new rugged, no-moving-parts, low power-consuming computers, dot-matrix printers, keyboards and roller balls. These are powered by foot cranks - stationery bicycles with generators running against the rims hooked to batteries. The batteries are hooked to the computers and printers via cable.

Jhai's Remote IT Village Initiative aims to empower five villages in a remote valley, without electricity or phones, with a means of communication and the use of simple business tools. The Remote IT Village pilot test will link five villages in the HinHeup District, about a hundred kilometres (100km) from Vientiane, the implementation of wireless Wide-Area Network(WAN) is use. Villagers will use Voice-over-IP to communicate to the outside world. Telephony and Lao-language business tools, which designed by our very own software expert, will help their standard of living while preserving traditions. The network will immediately enhance business and trade opportunities for organic rice and produce in market towns and the capital, Vientiane, and the establishment of a local market for sales of a variety of products among villagers themselves. Villagers will also connect by voice and email with family members who now live overseas. The system is owned by the villagers and is run by literate middle school kids - literate in Lao. No one in these villages has much English.

Jhai.s Internet Learning Centers Project has enabled Lao secondary schools to develop sustainable computer labs combining educational purposes with for-profit outreach to the community. The Jhai ILCs provide students with technology training, plus the chance to communicate with others and to collaborate on projects. The project is run by Lao people themselves and is developed through on-the-ground, rigorous planning with an emphasis on sustainability.

Jhai's Internet Learning Centers have been awarded a prestigious 2001 Stockholm Challenge Award in education. The Jhai ILCs have also been selected as a premier project by the 300-member Technology Empowerment Network.

Both Remote IT projects and Internet Learning centers are the tools for linking the Lao kids/students to the world which is the long term goal of Jhai Foundation.