Diasporas and new media for development - perspectives

The role of new media in communication exchange and the culture of diasporas cannot be underestimated, from the multifarious daily contacts between people across the world, to large scale transfer of remittance.
The meeting will discuss the perspectives of involving new media and diasporas in development processes in the global South focusing on knowledge-transfer and build up of expertise and practices based on new media for development - what the UN has framed ICT4D.
The meeting will debate how ICT can be focused on development, taking existing projects and experiences into account. The groundbreaking work with smart phones in health development and agriculture by mPower Social Enterprises Ltd., Dhaka, Bangladesh (http://www.mpower-social.com) will be presented, along with cases from Somaliland, and a debate with stakeholders from the Somaliland diaspora, among them Somali Health for All Initiative Trust – Shifat, Hargeisa, Somaliland (http://shifat.org).

Program
13.00-13.15 Anders Michelsen: Introduction: Health, Diasporas and ICT4D - Somaliland as case
13.15-14.15 Hasib Ahsan: "ICT led Development Projects for the Underprivileged: Cases from Bangladesh"
14.15-14.45 Break, Coffee.
14.45-15.15 Musa Yousuf: “Health Systems Management in Somaliland and ICT” (online participation),
15.15-16.00 Debate: Hasib Ahsan, Musa Yousuf, Mahad Farah Aden, Danish-Somaliland Friendship Society, and Anders Michelsen.
16.00 End of meeting.

Participants
Hasib Ahsan, mPower Social Enterprises Ltd., Dhaka, Bangladesh (http://www.mpower-social.com)
Anders Michelsen, Centre for Advanced Migration Studies and Department of Arts and Cultural Studies, University of
Copenhagen, Denmark (http://amis.ku.dk)
Musa Yousuf, Somali Health for All Initiative Trust - SHIFAT, Hargeisa, Somaliland (http://shifat.org)
Mahad Farah Aden, Danish-Somaliland Friendship Society, Copenhagen, Denmark (http://www.dansl.org)

Contact
Anders Michelsen, Centre for Advanced Migration Studies and Department of Arts and Cultural Studies, University of Copenhagen: amichel@hum.ku.dk