[APCPress] No embargo: Computer Aid in Southern Africa

[Karen Higgs]

Please find below a press release issued by APC member in London, 
Computer Aid International. We believe you will find it of interest.

Computer Aid International is the world’s largest not-for-profit 
provider of refurbished PCs for education and other non-profit 
organisations. Of the 42,000 quality PCs provided to date over 13,700 
computers have been delivered to organisations from the 12 countries 
that will now be supported by the new Johannesburg office.

Best wishes
APC

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Press Release
Computer Aid International
Johannesburg Office Opened
January 13th 2005

Beginning of a process of regionalisation APC member Computer Aid 
International this week opened its Southern Africa Regional offfice in 
Johannesburg, South Africa. Co-located at the premises of another APC 
member Women'sNet, the new Computer Aid office will support existing and 
future partners in Angola, Botswana, DRC, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, 
Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Dr. Hillar Addo has been appointed to the post of Southern Africa 
Programme Officer and will run the new regional office for Southern 
Africa. Dr. Addo previously held the post of Network Coordinator for the 
pan-African school-networking movement SchoolNet Africa.

« Joining Computer Aid is an exciting way for me to continue to support 
the efforts of literally millions of learners actively employing ICTs in 
education across Southern Africa. It’s also a great opportunity to 
assist those endeavouring to make a difference to their individual lives 
as well as supporting thousands of civil society organisations actively 
applying ICTs for development.  I believe these are some of the most 
pressing practical challenges of the Information Age » Dr. Hillar Addo

The new office launch has coincided with the arrival in Maputo of 450 
Pentium II and Pentium III PCs to kick-start the SchoolNet Mozambique 
programme. SchoolNet Mozambique Co-ordinator Kauxique Maganlal said « 
These PCs will be used to establish crucial training labs in 10 
provincial teacher training centres across Mozambique. We will then be 
using Computer Aid PCs to roll-out a national programme of ICTs in 
Education in state schools nationwide».

Computer Aid International is the world’s largest not-for-profit 
provider of refurbished PCs for education and other non-profit 
organisations. Of the 42,000 quality PCs provided to date over 13,700 
computers have been delivered to organisations from the 12 countries 
that will now be supported by the new Johannesburg office.

Computer Aid has many long-term partners in the region. CIDA Ubuntu 
University was started by ex-actuary turned social entrepreneur Taddy 
Blecher in Joburg’s largely abandoned Central Business District. "Taddy 
had no computers and wondered how he was going to teach essential 
computer courses. He photocopied dozens of keyboards and took them into 
the lectures. He taught the students to touch type and by the time their 
computers arived they were already typing 30wpm," explains Nikki Behr, 
marketing and fund-raising executive at the university. Remarkably CIDA 
now have the largest educational IT lab in sub-Saharan Africa as a 
result of over 1,000 PCs from Computer Aid International.

http://www.cida.co.za/

Other partners in the region include the Child Soldiers Coalition of 
Congo, the National Youth Organisation of Malawi, Schools Without 
Boarders in Angola and the Commission for Justice and Peace in Zimbabwe. 
Over 2,500 PC have already been provided to an on-going programme in 
Swaziland where Computer Aid have delivered a minimum of 20 PCs each to 
over half of the state secondary and high schools in the country in 
co-operation with local NGO the Computer Education Trust.

« The appointment of Dr. Addo and the opening of the Southern Africa 
office will enable Computer Aid to dramatically extend its provision 
across the region and significantly increase the level and quality of 
effective support to the region’s ICT for Development and ICT in 
Education programmes. » announced Caroline Fuseau Computer Aid’s Africa 
Programme Officer.


« The Southern Africa office is only the first of several regional 
offices that we will establish this year in an effort to locate support 
closer to partners, increase the number of recipient organisations and 
improve monitoring and evaluation » commented Tony Roberts, CEO of 
Computer Aid. «  We are now actively searching for the right person to 
lead our East Africa Programme from a second office in Nairobi ».


Computer Aid Profile :

Computer Aid International is the world’s largest and most experienced 
non-profit provider of fully refurbished Pentium II and Pentium III PCs 
to educational and not-for-profit organisations in developing countries.

Computer Aid has already provided over 42,000 fully tested, refurbished 
and upgraded PCs where they are most needed, in schools and community 
organisations in more that 90 different countries.

Computer Aid has supplied PCs to Oxfam, Save the Children, Action Aid, 
SightSavers
International, UNESCO and the World Bank as well as to over 5,000 
schools, colleges, CBOs and NGOs.

Based in London Computer Aid has built strategic supply relationships 
with UK corporations who donate their older PCs when upgrading to the 
latest, most expensive, new technology. Companies such as British 
Airways, Dell, University of London, and Packard Bell donate to Computer 
Aid through their corporate social responsibility programmes.

In London a team of 40 dedicated technicians collect, test, 
professionally refurbish and upgrade the PCs to a high standard before 
carefully packaging them ready for shipping.

Any non-profit organisation in any developing country can apply to 
receive any number of PCs. There is a small handling fee of £39 plus 
shipping per PC to pay.

Applications can be made on-line at the Computer Aid website where much 
more information about the work of Computer Aid International can be found.

www.computeraid.org