The e-society programme connects the unconnected rural and disadvantaged communities in Sri Lanka to the world of information and communication through new technologies.

The programme initiated and implemented under the e-Sri Lanka project by the Information Communication Technology (ICT) Agency stood out for its community driven use of ICT for Development (ICT4D). Encouraging local expertise, the e-society programme showed how it has adroitly used ICT to develop programmes that have helped rural farmers to access agricultural market information, provide social services and education opportunities to individuals and assist the disabled. In addition, the programme demonstrated how new digital content products developed through e-society grants have harnessed local expertise to provide easier access to knowledge and learning for the vision and hearing impaired persons.

The e-Society Program was also presented at the “Ideas Market” – a forum which presented emerging opportunities in ICTs and Social Media that would augment the World Bank’s development work.

“Many Senior Managers from a number of regions expressed much interest in learning more and replicating the e-Society concept and resulting projects and suggested that workshops be held for Task Managers of the World Bank.,” said Sandra Sargent, Operations Officer at the World Bank.

Suggestions were also made for establishing further cross-country and cross-regional collaboration between the ICTA and agencies implementing similar initiatives in other countries.