By Morton Saulo
If cyber cafÈs and other Information Technology (IT) installations are distinguishing features in big towns, then a small, dusty market has attained modern status.
Isinya, in Kajiado District, has become the latest beneficiary of a project by Arid Lands Information Network (ALIN), an organisation working to bring IT to rural villages. It aims to furnish residents with information to assist in local development.
Mr Robert Agina, a teacher at Isinya Primary School, shows two Maasai women how to use the Internet. [PHOTO: MORTON SAULO/STANDARD]
Last week, ALIN opened an Internet cafÈ and cultural centre to help residents access information to help them improve their lifestyles and their local economy.
Maasai men and women can now walk from villages into the ALIN centre and surf (or be taught how to surf) the Internet, particularly an ALIN website.
The centre, like 11 others, opens elsewhere in interior locations in the country, has seven Internet-connected computers.
ALIN has launched a website with a range of information, covering all communities it aims to help. For instance, in Isinya, villagers will be connected to a site that features the pastoralist way of life of other Africans.
The website has information on how such communities handle their pastoralist-related challenges and how they have diversified to other types of agriculture.
Detention camp
A group of old, illiterate Maasai women at Isinya were taught how to access information at the centre before it was opened last Thursday, by Information PS Bitange Ndemo.
They are assisted by local volunteer field officers to decipher Internet jargon. It was amazing to watch the old women using a computer.
A village like Isinya, now thus empowered, is referred to by ALIN as a ‘digital village’.
Isinya evolved from a one time Mau Mau detention camp, where no information was allowed to filter in or out.
Mr Noah Lusaka, programmes manager at ALIN, explains that bridging the digital divide for interior villages started when Worldspace Radio was introduced to the country — it has since evolved into the creation of digital villages.
He adds that most communities in rural Kenya will open up when the fibre optic cable is finally installed and WiMAX technology put into place.
Lusaka says his organisation has 11 other such centres of information, where news is extracted and disseminated to local communities: "We are trying to create our local content rather than having rural Kenyans saturated with foreign content since some locals have refused to appreciate them."
Lusaka says the Maasai at Isinya and parts of Kajiado near the centre can now get information on livestock diseases and how to improve their pasture, develop other types of agriculture.
"What we do is visit other communities, learn their best practices in farming and livestock breeding and avail the information to our farmers at the click of a button in these digital centres," he says.
He adds that communities as far as Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda are interacting through the Internet and have been able to trade skills.
ALIN Regional Director James Nguo says his organisation is looking to tap into the potential of digital villages and develop local content for Kenyans in arid regions.
"We are facilitating the exchange of information among different communities to foster development instead of such communities being dependent on food aid.
It was evidently a big day at Isinya last Thursday, as droves of villagers trekked from Ilpolosat, Kisaju, Enkirgirri and Noosayian to Isinya Community Knowledge Centre.
Apart from being a digital village, it also offers cultural knowledge about the Maasai community and how they can exploit it to their financial benefit.
Ms Rahab Nyangena, 70, says: "This things (computers) will help us change our lives."
Proper breeding
She is in a group of women who have learned how to start small-scale horticulture farms near the centre. She adds that, through the centre, she has learned proper breeding.
"Instead of having hundreds of cows in your boma, one can just have a few exotic ones and even sell milk to neighbours," she says.
She adds: "From this thing we can read about the best practices on animal and crop husbandry."
Mr Robert Agina, a teacher at Isinya Primary School, says he simply goes to the centre and downloads the latest information on social studies and saves it in his ipod.