A scan of the Estimates for 2.12/13 shows that there is no significant monies given to head 16 – ICTs.

The rub here is that Barbados is suppose to have superior communications infrastructure, it is why we pay through our teeth for telecoms services. It is why our Internet penetration is one of the highest in the world. How the hell are we losing out to the other countries in the region that are suppose to be way behind us?

Call centers are not the path towards development in ICT….quite the opposite. They provide employment but do not lead to the development of ICT skills. They also only last as long as the tax concessions or other favourable conditions that brought them here….at which point, it’s back to square one.

Regarding LIME, take a look at the Hackathon they’re holding on Friday: http://www.lime.com/hackathon

As a Barbadian employed in the ICT sector living in the UK for the last 5 years, I must say that on my return to Barbados last year I was appalled by the lack of growth in this sector. A large part of this must be attributed to the goverenment and it’s dealings with C&W, now known as LIME. While LIME like to boast of the fibre optic infrastructure they invested in Barbados (no mean feat for such a small market I might add) that was done 5-6 years ago. Where has been the benefit? Call centres were once in abundance in Fontabelle…did the high price of leased lines run them away? While politcally, having Digicel’s headquarters in Barbados is seen as a feather in our cap, that’s not where the money is. Where are the digicel and lime datacentres? if they aren’t in Barbados, why didn’t we try to get that business considering our core fibre optic infrastructure. Again, did it come down to the high price of our infrastructure? It seems LIME thought they could invest in Barbados and then hold the entire country to ransom, asking businesses to pay prices that are too high. International companies have a lot more low cost options than 5 years ago, however, and Barbados as an option can be easily bypassed. The government needs to take a long hard look at the telecoms act and make some big changes to that legislation to make the country competitive.

ICT is far more than call centres. I depict call centres as where they take intelligent youth and train them to be monkeys.

The UK is waking up to the reality that clicking proficiently through Windows is not creative and something beyond that is required to close the skills gap that exists which forces industries to look to countries like India to provide the programming and development skills they require to survive.
Enter the Rasberry Pi developed by smart guys here to provide a very cheap means of a learning and development platform to bring innovation within the reach of the poorest.

My reservation is that the teachers in schools, colleges and Universities do not by and large have the skills to impart to their students. There was a recent report by UK industry on IT skills titled “Running on empty”.

The ICT or IT structure in countries like India and Singapore is geared to providing consummate skilled professionals capable of design, programming and development if IT systems the world requires. That’s why companies from across the world flock to Bangalore each year to recruit staff and convinced a company like HP to set up a development centre in Singapore.

It skills need to be developed from a young age in primary/elementary schools to provide the basis for ongoing education and the bedrock for providing industry with employees with the requisite skill set and the ability to adapt to changing requirements.

In 34 years in the industry working in development, lecturing and supporting a goodly number of the largest corporations using IT it’s appalling to see the products of our schools, colleges and Universities emerging only with an ability to use Windows and with no skills other than producing application programmers for Windows.
There are an abundance of embedded systems coming to market that require different skills, Field Programmable Grid Arrays (FPGA’s), etc. that appear in your car, TV set, washing machine, set top box and more. Smart knowledgeable people are required to be agile as the requirements change so rapidly nowadays.

I’m 8 years into retirement and still keeping up with developments, 8 computers and an array of equipment, some sending me scrambling back through my maths books of over 40 years ago to get an understanding.

Sometimes just having a PC at home and Operating systems software that is freely available on the internet, together with an enquiring mind is all it takes, ask google, ask RedHat and others. Matthew Sulzic started out configuring Linux in his bedroom at home for a proposed project, then saw an opportunity to turn it into a billion dollar business by starting RedHat.

Why do I not see anyone from Barbados/Caribbean in any of the many software or hardware forums I frequent daily? Why do I see none contributing to those developments or even seeking help?
That’s a way of getting the attention of companies looking to recruit talent. That’s why some monts ago I was offered employment by Google, sadly I had to turn them down as I’m happily retired and do this for fun, expanding my horizons and keeping up with the latest.

When policy makers see ICT as a cross sector tool of empowerment and a foundation upon which productivity and efficiency can be built upon rather than a bastard child that is called up when a report needs printing or analysis then we may actually make progress. Encouraging entrepreneurship, innovation and technology experimentation among our younger children (while backing it up with adult opportunities and professional mentorship) can also go a long way to getting us past the state of stagnation. Our national ICT strategy spans 5 years, 2 of which are already gone. In “technology” terms two years is an entire generation.

Shannon wrote, “Call centers are not the path towards development in ICT.”

Sid Boyce wrote,”ICT is far more than call centres. I depict call centres as where they take intelligent youth and train them to be monkeys.

As usual the BU family nails it. One Toronto writer of Caribbean ancestry named them the modern day plantations.

Knee jerk reactions will not create meaningful, good paying jobs. It is not too late to give scholarships in Computer programming, Industrial Design and Animation to Barbadian students.

Target Industries based on what the average worker earns in that Industry and the profitability. Bajans in the diaspora work in the whole range of “ICT”. They are no more intelligent than bajans at home so give the youngsters meaningful scholarships.

We already have enough Doctors,Lawyers and Priests.

@David
There’s a national ICT strategy, a section on ICT in the National Development plan as well as the MTDS, and the recent HR Strategy not to mention each party’s 2008 manifesto. Seems all well and good until we find leaders with the gumption to see it as a ubiquitous part of our existence and development rather than nice section for policy documents. To their credit there seems to be movement towards better integration in government, but alas, some 7 years after the fact.

David can you provide a list of the 5 top Industries in Barbados?

Sid Boyce

You turn down an offer from Google …? Now I know that you are NOT all together upstairs …! You should keep that level of foolishness to yourself man ( …give a shit how old you think you are …)

In any event to add to what you have said, (LOL) animation is also part of the ITC campaign and Canada seems to be leading the way ahead of Japan and others. Is Barbados attempting some development in this area?

OK Shannon and Boyce clearly folks that sound like they understand ICT …. what do you see as ICT areas we can turn into JOBS looking to the future in Barbados?

We have to become a society of problem solvers through dialogue … Which is why I try too allow provide answers or solutions to issues I raise ….

Hi Austin,

My quick answer to that would be that we should focus on encouraging our local brilliant minds to develop software….not just smartphone apps either (eventhough those do get a quick buck and fame)….but also enterprise software. While good (?) for tourism, millions of dollars are spent every few years by Government and the larger businesses to purchase software packages from overseas and pay the high fees of their consultants who come for a few weeks to set up the software. This leaves the on-staff IT burdened with the task of maintenance and training the other staff while also teleconferencing with the consultants who returned home months ago. This is a widespread practice throughout the Caribbean and needs to stop.

We can develop our own software the same way that we write our own songs.

How to encourage software development? Well, it’ll take some of what is needed in the other areas of the creative sector ie promotion and respect of intellectual property. One low-hanging fruit is that UWI and BCC students should definitely be entering the annual Microsoft ImagineCup Competition like students from Jamaica and Trinidad do every year. Unfortunately, despite the stalwart (?) attempts of some UWI lecturers, we’ve probably only ever had 2 teams progress in those competitions………and who knows where they are now?

Call Centres have been described as “A Place where Dreams go to die”. The chances of major Corporations setting up Global Call Centre with positions which require very little technical skills in Barbados are slim and none, one of the major reasons the reasons can be summed in one word “Unions”. The people who make these decisions are well briefed on the political, social and labour climate of any jurisdiction they consider and Union(s) in Barbados have penetrated every sector of the labour force. Many of the workers are not afraid to down their tools/pencils if they so much as get a hangnail, these folks wouldn’t want to establish a Call Centre and the Union steps in to dictate how things should be run. They will take their businesses to countries like India which has large pool of willing workers who come cheap with no labour Union to contend with