Johannesburg, 02 Nov 2006
Skills development and usage of open source software in education are crucial factors for SA in mapping a successful ICT strategy.
Billionaire and open source software (OSS) guru Mark Shuttleworth delivered this message via video recording at the GovTech conference, at Sun City this week.
"The creation of intellectual property and human capital is the biggest bottleneck to turning a country around and making that country a successful IT player, whether it be the production of technology or simply the use of technology."
Shuttleworth noted India's initiatives in growing ICT skills and warned of the dearth of local ICT skills that could cripple the sector.
"India graduates 400 000 ICT graduates a year, but even they are saying this amount is insufficient to meet the demand."
He continued: "SA needs to place substantially increased emphasis on technology in education at all levels: in the classroom, at schools, in universities and in technical training facilities."
An avid campaigner for OSS, Shuttleworth noted that every emerging market country, that is pushing a technology agenda, focuses heavily on the most effective ways to harness OSS. He said SA must show a strong commitment to the use of free OSS in education to help build ICT skills.
"Besides the fact that I believe free OSS is a future pervasive technology platform of the world, there is a better fit between the process of education and the framework that surrounds the free OSS movement than there is in proprietary software."
He said Spain was able to provide education software to enable a wide set of skills which was not economically feasible using proprietary education software.
"What we see is because of the nature of licensing around free OSS. Schools that build their education around a free software platform are able to provide almost every aspect of education in a digital form."
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