Nancy Hafkin & ICT in Africa

Dr. Nancy J. Hafkin has been a true pioneer of networking, and development information and communications in Africa, over the course of a twenty-three year career. Nancy was among the first to enter the field of electronic communications in Africa. Her advocacy around this issue has drawn attention to the growing potential of ICTs in Africa, and the cost to Africa of remaining outside the process of social and economic change brought about by the development of the global information society. Her dedication, enthusiasm, and hard work have been exemplary. Nancy's devotion to African networking and her confidence in the African continent and its human resources have helped build Africa's ICT framework through partnerships with governmental, nongovernmental and development institutions.

Nancy Hafkin founded and spearheaded the Pan African Development Information System (PADIS) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), as Officer-in-Charge from its inception in 1980 until 1997. She later served as Team Leader for Promoting of Information Technology for Development, of the Development Information Services Division of ECA (UN) from 1997 until 2000. There she also served as Coordinator of the African Information Society Initiative (AISI), the African mandate to use ICTs to accelerate socio-economic development in Africa. Nancy also served as a facilitator in establishing the Partnership for Information and Communication Technologies in Africa (PICTA), a coordinating body of donor and executing agency partners in support of the AISI.

Nancy Hafkin played a central role in facilitating the APC's work to enable email connectivity in more than 10 countries during the early 1990s, before full Internet connectivity became a reality in most of Africa.