Country Programmes serve to help local partners implement and develop their own ICT-enabled development projects and policies within key development sectors.

IICD is currently implementing nine Country Programmes, in Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Ecuador, Ghana, Jamaica, Mali, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. They focus on the sectors education, environment, governance, health and (agricultural) livelihoods.

IICD Country Programmes are long-term investments covering a 5-7 year period. However, the nature and intensity of IICD's support changes over time as local partners become more self-reliant.

Country Programme activities

The starting point in a Country Programme is to identify – and work with – a small network of committed local organisations. In each country IICD focuses on two or more of the key development sectors where it brings together stakeholders and helps them to formulate and execute ICT-enabled development projects and policies.

Within the framework of a Country Programme, IICD assists local partners to use ICT on their own terms. Below is a list of the main areas of support provided and activities carried out under the umbella of a Country Programme.

• Roundtable workshops
• Projects
• National ICT for Development Policies
• Capacity development
• Knowledge and skills sharing
• National ICT for Development Networks
• Monitoring and Evaluation
• Partnerships

IICD’s work is defined by a set of guiding principles that influence all our activities. These are: capacity development, multi-stakeholder involvement, partnerships, local ownership, demand-driven, learning by doing, and gender equality. Even though they are automatically applied at all levels within IICD, they are continually re-evaluated and reviewed to ensure their relevance to development cooperation.

Evolution of a Country Programme

To achieve locally owned ICT for Development (ICT4D) programmes and policies, IICD takes a systematic approach whereby each Country Programme passes through four pre-defined phases: initiation, expansion, consolidation and shared dialogue.

The initiation phase consists of setting up projects and establishing a capacity development programme, a knowledge sharing network and an independent monitoring and evaluation process. A Roundtable workshop usually acts as the starting point for a Country Programme, during which participants are encouraged to formulate project ideas for one priority sector.

In the expansion phase, this process is repeated, and additional Roundtable workshops help to formulate projects for other priority sectors. With sufficient projects in implementation, a Country Programme advances to the consolidation phase.

In the consolidation phase the emphasis is no longer on creating new projects but on embedding existing projects in institutions and sectors and harvesting the lessons learned.

The final phase – shared dialogue – marks the end of IICD project funding. IICD does, however, continue to provide support for the national ICT for Development network, whose role is to independently carry out advocacy, advisory, and networking activities, and to influence policy processes.