STUDENTS FROM different colleges and universities in Luzon gathered at the Leong Hall Auditorium on March 11 to attend the forum, “Bridging the Digital Divide through Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Development.”

As part of the 15th Young Economists’ Luzon Convention, a shared project between the Ateneo Economics Association and the De La Salle University-Manila Economics Organization, the talk informed students about the impacts of ICT and the role it plays in the country’s development.

Speakers in attendance were Deputy Executive Director of the Department of Science and Technology-Information and Communications Technology Office Monchito Ibrahim, Vice President for IT-Enabled Services Group Reynaldo Lugtu, and Ateneo de Manila University Information Systems and Computer Science Professor Ma. Mercedes Rodrigo, PhD.

ICT in education

Lugtu enumerated the different problems plaguing the country and how the private sector has been responding to them by developing ICT.

While he reported that the country has approximately 44 million internet users, and 36 million of them are active in social media, Lugtu acknowledged that the country is still a “laggard” with internet speed.

He said, “This is a major problem in the Philippines because there is a clear link between the internet and the economy–the higher the speed of internet in the country, the higher the growth rate of the economy.”

According to Lugtu, government agencies are partnering with the private sector in finding different ways to expand internet use.

He mentioned that TV White Spaces are now being explored by Microsoft to alleviate the internet problem in the country. TV White Spaces are radio waves used for television which are now being utilized in some areas as channels for internet.

Lugtu also included the shortage of teachers and classrooms in the list of problems being addressed by the private sector through ICT. Among the initiatives are computer donations to underprivileged schools, as well as the endorsement of tablets as a mode of instruction.

“Education is the key pillar in the building the future,” Lugtu said. “[ICT] is transforming the ways in which students learn and teachers teach.”

On the other hand, Rodrigo touched on the status of computer-based learning and education in the country–the challenges it faces, and the opportunities which result from its development.

Rodrigo shared that 39% of schools in the country apply ICT while 11% use ICT for lesson preparations geared towards student-centered learning. Although the figures are stable, internal divide still plagues the country.

“Some cities have better access to technology and connectivity. There are almost 8,000 schools which do not have electricity and a lot which do not have cellphone [network] access. Infrastructure still remains to be a problem,” she said.

Other challenges include the reluctance of school administrations to distribute consent forms, logistical concerns of travelling to different school sites, conflict with other school activities, and students and teachers’ lack of familiarity with the software and technology.

Rodrigo added, “There is also a problem with content which is mostly developed in “WEIRD” countries. That’s an acronym for Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic countries.”

“Some content [is] actually culturally inappropriate, I don’t mean that in a bad way. There are allusions to baseball which we have here, but if we take them to the provinces, maybe they’re not familiar with it,” she said.

According to Rodrigo, there are also opportunities apart from these challenges. One opportunity is developing local content such as the creation of a computer game about Philippine history which students are familiar with.

She said, “We won’t be getting better and deeper grasp of the subject matter if we only stick to computer literacy training which is the first step. We have to go beyond that and find innovative ways of using our technologies.”

ICT in employment

Apart from education, Lugtu stressed that ICT has also been playing a significant role in addressing unemployment in the country.

“The Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) sector contributes to the employment of more than a million employees in the country. It is also a big contributor to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). [BPOs] are predicted to grow in double digits in the coming years,” he explained.

He added that it comes as a surprise to him whenever politicians take credit for the BPO sector because for him, it has been growing “with or without government intervention.”

Lugtu emphasized, “No one can truly claim this success because we have been growing in spite of government. But imagine if government gets a lot better. To those who are voting, choose your future. The next six years of your lives depend on the president.”

He believes that ICT gives everyone the opportunity to access information, allowing people to make informed decisions, thus making ICT a potential equalizer in our society.

While Ibrahim recognizes the role of BPOs in the country’s economic development, he urges that the “politically correct” term people should use is Business Process Management (BPM).

He reported that at the end of 2015, the country reached a direct employment figure of 1.2 million full-time employees and a revenue of USD 22 billion in the BPM sector alone.

Ibrahim noted, “If you ask the location [of the figures], 70% of this 1.2 M are in Metro Manila, while the remaining 30% are outside the capital.”

According to him, the target by the end of this year is to make the ratio 60% in Metro Manila and 40% outside of it, but a ratio of 65:35 would be sufficient.

“The talents are actually staying in the province now, so we bring the jobs to where they are. This could help in decongesting the traffic in Manila,” he said.

Working in India before and being able to observe the steps the country took with regard to wage inflation, Ibrahim developed the initiative “Next Wave Cities” to combat the same phenomena which was beginning to worsen in the Philippines.

He said, “Next Wave Cities is a program that helps cities outside of Metro Manila to develop so that they may become attractive to BPMs. Every two years, we assess the ranking of the cities. We are actually graduating two more cities to become Centers of Excellence.”

Under their guidelines, a city becomes a Center of Excellence when it reaches a direct employment figure of at least 25,000.

“We are only a team of about 50 people so we help organize local ICT councils. Today, there are almost 50 ICT councils and they have now organized themselves into a national federation,” he said.

Ibrahim added, “I hope this is something that would help us with the development of countryside BPM sector.”