Stories, ideas, and updates from DGers around the world

The Development Gateway Foundation announces today a new partnership with the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) to establish online communities dedicated to disaster prevention and reconstruction. These new portals will provide a virtual space in which participants can share knowledge, best practices, and other relevant information. The purpose of this initiative is to build capacity, strengthen working relationships, and improve development outcomes. Particular emphasis will be placed on bringing together government agencies and international and nongovernmental organizations in developed and developing countries to…

The Development Gateway Foundation, as part of its mission to reduce poverty and enable change in developing nations, has been quietly moving mountains through information technology for seven years. Below is a brief rundown of its recent global initiatives. For more information, visit www.developmentgateway.org, or call Elizabeth Corley at 202-572-9236 to arrange for interviews. Vietnam Launches Local dgMarket dgMarket, the online platform for government tenders, publishes information on public sector contracts, valued at $540 billion, in more than 20 languages. Recently, the 20th local implementation…

The Development Gateway Foundation’s e-procurement information system, dgMarket, was launched at an event held in Hanoi yesterday attended by representatives of the Vietnamese government and the business and donor communities. This dgMarket implementation was primarily funded by the government of Australia and supported by the government of Luxembourg. The global dgMarket Web site provides easy access to information on more than $540 billion worth of public sector contracts each year, in 23 languages. These include government contracts in 150 countries funded through international lending agencies…

The Development Gateway Foundation announced today an agreement to collaborate with the French Development Agency (AFD) to publish its tenders online. The aid agency chose dgMarket, the foundation’s platform for online tenders, to publish tenders for all projects funded by AFD. It will include notices from 60 countries in three languages: French, Spanish, and English. In 2005, the French agency committed approximately $3.4 billion, primarily to countries in Africa and Asia. “We have numerous complex aid programs running simultaneously in priority countries,” explained Jean-Michel Severino,…

*Mindset Network's satellite-based technology delivers multimedia educational content straight to students.* South Africa When Mindset Network of South Africa won the 2006 Development Gateway Award, it was already well established as a leader in providing high-quality multimedia educational content. It had installed receivers for its satellite-based delivery system in more than 1,500 schools and 300 hospitals and clinics. Mindset had created educational content on subjects such as HIV/AIDS, TB, and child survival for the health sector and science, math, IT, and English for schools. It…

The Bibliotheca Alexandrina and the Development Gateway Foundation announced today the launch of a virtual community in Arabic on the theme of Arab reform. The new portal will serve as a platform for aggregating information about reform activities in the Arab world. Creating a virtual community, the site will facilitate the sharing of knowledge among development practitioners. It will also aid in capacity building and improving access to high quality development research and analysis in Arabic throughout the developing world. The Arab reform portal adds…

Telemática e Desenvolvimento Ltda announced today the launch of the e-Brazil portal, a bilingual portal that is part of the international network of country gateways supported by the Development Gateway Foundation. The e-Brazil portal, in English and Portuguese, brings together information and discussions related to the use of information and communications technologies (ICTs) to build a more equitable and more competitive Brazil. The goal is to show the contributions ICT organizations are making to achieve these two basic objectives. Another goal is to build consensus…

The Development Gateway Foundation and FreeBalance today announced a strategic alliance to integrate public financial management and aid management software. The alliance partners have recorded their first major milestone with the successful integration of budget and accounting modules from the FreeBalance Government Accountability Suite with the Aid Management Platform from the Development Gateway Foundation. The Aid Management Platform (AMP) is a Web-based application that enables governments to better manage and coordinate development assistance. Designed for use by governments and their development partners, AMP improves and…

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – In concurrence with the Arab Strategy Forum, a new online government tender information service in Arabic and English will be launched through a partnership between Tejari and the Development Gateway Foundation. The new ‘Manshoori’ service, based on the state-of-the-art dgMarket tender publishing platform and created as part of the Tejari business-to-business marketplace, will enable governments across the Middle East to post local “e-tenders” for new infrastructure projects. Manshoori will be the region’s first deployment of the Development Gateway’s web-based dgMarket…

HONG KONG—Mindset Network of Johannesburg, South Africa, has been chosen from a group of over 160 nominees as the winner of the 2006 Development Gateway Award. The Development Gateway Foundation awarded $100,000 to Mindset Network, a nonprofit organization, in recognition of its developing and providing educational materials on a mass scale through information technology. The 2006 Development Gateway Award was on the theme of youth and was presented today at ITU Telecom World 2006 in Hong Kong. Mindset Network provides assistance through a satellite-based technology…