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Newsletter of ICVolunteers N° 13, Second Quarter 2005

Page 1: Agenda Page 3: Social integration through ICTs Page 6: Feeback: to be part of the ICV Office team... Cooperation is the key Page 4: Learning by seeing it with your own eyes Page 7: in South Page 2: Internet tips for translators is development Page 5: Volunteer reporters bring in fresh perspective Page 8: Local loops and microwave links

Agenda TRANSLATORS AND INTERPRETERS BRIDGE LINGUISTIC GAPS Almería, 6 - 7 May 2005 Jornada social y nuevas tecnologías: COOPERATION IS THE KEY Cibervoluntariado y Ciberactivismo Brazzaville, Congo 16 - 18 May 2005 Symposium: link ICT research to development Fribourg, 5-7 June 2005 Swiss Social Forum , Switzerland 8 May 2005 Genève Marathon 15-24 June 2005 Landmine Survivors Network 25 July - 12 August 2005 UN Sub-Commission on Human Rights 11-13 October 2005 International Platform for Sustainable Urban Development What is the difference between a fessional translator. ‘Translators often volunteer interpreter and one that work in isolation and get little feedback Lucerne, Switzerland is offering a paid service? There is when they send in a translation job (typ- 30 May - 3 June 2005 actually more than just the volun- ically only when there is a problem). Not European University of tary nature that separates the two. so when volunteering with ICVolunteers, Voluntary Service (EFU) For volunteers, often one important according to Wendy: ‘You are part of a Montreal, Canada difference seems to be that they can team. Since my first volunteer experi- invest more in the people they work ence at the 18th IAVE World Volunteer 29 May - 1 June 2005 with, apart from offering their pro- Conference in Barcelona in 2004, I have Montreal International Forum (FIM) fessional skills. This is what several met up with many of the interpreters. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil of our interpreters and translators We are more than just colleagues, in fact 8-10 June 2005 have experienced, as well as the real partners.’ people for whom they translate. Regional Conference of the World Summit Volunteer interpreters are expected to on the Information Society Wendy, a professional translator and be flexible in their work, but the other Tunis, Tunisia interpreter originally from the United side of the coin is that there is always a 16-18 November 2005 States, now living in volunteered helping hand when the job gets challeng- World Summit on with ICV for the first time last year and ing. The volunteer translator or inter- the Information Society (Phase 2) was pleasantly surprised: ‘There is a true preter is less constrained by expecta- sense of cooperation and people go out tions of a professional role. ‘As a volun- Contact of their way to help one other’, she said teer I can concentrate on how to best ICVolunteers, PO Box 755, afterwards. communicate a message and help peo- 1211 Geneva 4, Switzerland ‘As there is less work pressure and a ple. It is very rewarding’, Wendy says. Phone: 41 22 800 14 36 / Fax: 37 sense of group spirit, it is quite easy to Another advantage: there is no maxi- Email: [email protected] make friends’, Wendy points out -- a Web: www.icvolunteers.org welcome change from working as a pro- continued on page 2 For full list of offices see page 8. 2 Volunteer News N° 13, Second Quarter 2005

continued from page 1 service, this would simply not have been clear need, she discovered. NGOs are possible for a program running over a often on the cutting edge of the increas- mum age limit for volunteer jobs. In period of 12 weeks. The alternative ingly interconnected world, and there- Barcelona, Wendy actually volunteered would have been to offer the courses in fore deal with multiple languages. They together with her daughter and other English only. However, this would have act as communication facilitators, includ- people of all ages. She spoke about excluded students who do not have ing cross-cultural and cross-language ‘great dynamics between generations’. knowlege of English, and also did not communication, and yet often work with seem a good solution for a course given very limited means. Mélanie Curtin con- Recipients of ICVolunteers’ interpreting in a French-speaking university and cludes: “Interpreters and translators -- services have been equally satisfied. The specifically focusing on the effects of especially recent graduates or profes- main reason being, of course, that com- globalization on development. sionals adding a language-- can gain prac- munication between people of different tical and useful experience in the field by nationalities is made much easier For young professionals and language stu- volunteering for NGOs. This exchange through interpretation --which can be dents, interpreting or translating as a can provide valuable experience for simultaneous or consecutive-- or the volunteer is also an excellent way to gain interpreters and translators, a valuable translation of documents. Without vol- experience. ICVolunteer Reuben Imray resource for NGOs, and overall pro- unteers, they would only have their own has been doing voluntary work for this motes international cooperation and language skills to rely on, because they very reason since he finished his studies at understanding.” (VK / CS) cannot afford professionals. Moreover, the University of Westminster (UK), and the cooperative spirit of the volunteers has volunteered twice with ICVolunteers. adds value. “As a (semi-)professional I gained valuable interpreting experience,” he says. “I also INTERNET TIPS FOR “We found it most helpful to have direct made friends in Geneva, which I am con- contact with the interpreters,” said TRANSLATORS sidering using as my professional base. I Tidjani Alou and Idrissa Laoualo from would certainly recommend volunteering Niger, who were attending a course in Dictionaries for young interpreters like myself start- development at the Graduate Institute • http://atilf.atilf.fr/tlfv3.htm: treasure ing out in the profession.” for Development Studies (IUED) in of French Even professionals with skills other than • http://europa.eu.int/eurodicau- interpretation and translation find it use- tom/Controller: translation for all ful to volunteer with their language skills, languages of the EU as Pok Chongcharoen experienced. She • www.granddictionnaire.com volunteered to help the Landmine /btml/fra/r_motclef/index800_1.as Survivors’ Network that strives to p: translation to and from French and English (Quebec French improve the situation of landmine vic- office). tims worldwide. Pok had worked for various international organizations in the • www.pons.de: German dictionary PONS (translation to and from areas of gender issues and child labor, French, English, Italian, Spanish, but not as a translator. “I am familiar Polish) with social work and felt I could con- • www.babels.org: Social Forum tribute meaningfully,” she said. “I trans- interpreters network lated oral and written texts for Thai and Laotian participants in a workshop lead- • www.telematin.fr (les 4 vérités, revue de presse) “Translations ing up to a landmine conference in 2003, without Borders” as well as summaries of landmine-relat- ed treaties, key definitions and other • http://www.google.com/ language_tools: Google automatic useful information for Thai participants online translation of a landmine conference in Nairobi in • www.unige.ch/biblio/eti/ 2004. What I got out of it myself was sat- 04basetermi.htm: terminology Geneva with the help of ICV-inter- isfaction, knowledge about new issues links of the ETI preters. In fact, the consecutive inter- and contact with people.” • www.lexicool.com: Dictionary of pretation --as used at IUED-- works ICV is one of the very few volunteer net- bilingual / multilingual dictionaries best if the interpreters develop a rela- works offering this kind of service to tionship with the students and get to Interpreting services study NGOs, as demonstrated by a study by know the course materials, says Pierre • http://piit.beplaced.com: Public Mélanie Curtin with the help of a Dyens, coordinator of the interpreters interest Interpreting Fellowship from the Haas Center for team. IUED found the help of the volun- Public Service at Stanford University, teers very successful and intends to and in partnership with ETI (Ecole de More links can be found in the link invite them for next year’s ‘Diploma of traduction et d’interprétation) at the section of ICVolunteers’ website continued in development University of Geneva. Volunteer inter- www.icvolunteers.org studies’ as well. Mr. Dyens added that, preting and translating responds to a had he to rely on a paid professional N° 13, Second Quarter 2005 Volunteer News 3

contributed to a symposium organized SOCIAL INTEGRATION THROUGH ICTS by Azur Développement in Brazzaville, on the theme of research and ICTs for FLEDGLING CYBERVOLUNTEERS PROGRAM TAKING OFF development. Approximately 80 stu- dents, representatives from associations and governments participated in the meeting. Viola Krebs, ICVolunteers’ Director, gave a seminar on research tools on the Internet. In addition, her presence at the Symposium was an occasion to launch the working group on “volunteerism, youth and ICTs” in Congo, whose mission it is to prepare a report and recommendations related to volunteerism and ICTs in view of the Tunis event of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) to be held in November 2005 (www.itu.int/wsis). : Shindouk, Touareg from the region of Timbuktu publish- es journal Shindouk, the main charac- ter of the documentary realized by ICV and CERN in 2003, just finished writing Our CyberVolunteers Program is well and truly taking off. Our fundraising din- a travel journal entitled ner in January was attended by more than 60 friends and members of ICV. ‘The West through the eyes of a While the benefits are not quite enough to cover the costs of an international Touareg.’ The nomad, leader of a tribe cyber-volunteer, they did help us launch the Program in Mali, Congo- of 1,500 persons in the region of Brazzaville and Uganda. Marouen Mraihi, cyber-volunteer from Tunisia, is fin- Timbuktu, describes his recent and first ishing up the first project, a portal for Malian Municipalities, with a Malian ever trip to from Timbuktu to team, and a locally based US cyber-volunteer graphic designer, but living in Geneva, where he attended the Cyber Mali, who is working on the design of the site. Marouen is doing fine, as you festival, organized on the occasion of will see on page 8. WSIS. Since then, Shindouk has become the first nomad cyber-volunteer. We are Capacity building for women in Integration of Women into Development currently looking for funds to print his Congo-Brazzaville in Congo, who told us that equality of story in book form. salaries between identical positions is in In Congo-Brazzaville, Azur On 24 March 2005, ICVolunteers organ- fact foreseen in the country’s constitu- Développement, partner ized a meeting in Bamako, to launch the tion. However, she underlined that the organization and represen- national working group on “volunteerism, disparities are mostly due to more tative of ICV in Congo, is in severe poverty of women. In order to the process of launching a continued on page 4 address this challenge, the Ministry has multimedia center. International and launched a micro-credit project for national cyber-volunteers are preparing ICV launches the website women-entrepreneurs. In this way, to support the activities of the center, Congo-Brazzaville following the exam- of CyberVolunteers focusing on information and communi- ple of other countries, where such proj- ICVolunteers proudly presents its cation technology (ICT) training for ects have experienced great success. new web site for the Cyber- women. This will provide them with the Volunteers Program, designed as a tools they need to enter active life and While ICV’ cyber-volunteers especially volunteer contribution by Jim entrepreneurship. focus on developing Azur’s multimedia Rudolf (SoftWares) and Randy center, they also interact with other This seems particularly necessary in Schmieder (MCART), both mem- actors, including the Ministry of the Congo-Brazzaville, a country emerging bers of the CyberVolunteers Promotion of Women and particularly its from several years of armed conflict. Program Technical Committee. “Maison de la femme”, a documentation According to the UNDP Development The web site contains information center aimed at women who wish to Report, the average revenue for women about the Program, work in learn more about their rights, and to is significantly lower than that of men. progress and plans for the future. read other documents not affordable We had the opportunity to meet H.E. Just have a look at and / or obtainable elsewhere. Ms. Leckomba Loumeto, Minister for http://cyber.icvolunteers.org. the Promotion of Women and the From 17 to 18 May 2005, ICVolunteers 4 Volunteer News N° 13, Second Quarter 2005

continued from page 3 Partnerships with Universities in Senegal THANK YOU youth and ICTs.” The meeting brought ICVolunteers has started to together some 50 organizations, as well as work with the University of We would like to thank: government and UN representatives. It Cheikh Anta Diop in Dakar was made possible thanks to the Ministry and the ‘Centre de forma- of Youth and Sports and the Ministry of tion supérieure’ (CESAG) • All the participants and sup- Communications and New Information porters of our January fundrais- which trains students for the sub-region Technologies. In Mali, the meeting was ing dinner and has an international reputation for opened by H.E. Mr. Adama Samassékou, business studies. The aim of these part- • INTIF for their financial sup- President of the PrepCom of the Geneva port nerships is to allow students to participate phase of the WSIS, followed by speeches as cyber-volunteers in different projects, • Coopération française for their by the Tunisian Ambassador to Mali and financial support be it during or after their studies. This is representatives from the two Ministries. especially the case for both projects in the • World Radio Geneva, which The aim of the working group is to pre- sub-region and at CERN (European donated seven computer pare a national report for Mali on the screens Center for Nuclear Reserach) in Geneva topic, outlining what volunteers do in the and neighboring France. (VK) • CISCO for computer screens country, as well as to bring forward spe- cific recommendations for the years to Read more about the Cyber- come. Volunteers Program on page 8.

COVERING THE UN COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS: LEARNING BY SEEING WITH YOUR OWN EYES Sending reporters to the annual meeting of the Commission on Human Rights has become almost rou- tine for ICVolunteers. But the service is being constantly improved. This year, the volunteers received great compli- ments.

experiences are firmly rooted in society. skills and interests as well,” he said. As Stefan Roesch noted as well: “It was “Together, we were able to provide very great to see it with my own eyes instead good coverage of the events. In fact, of in the newspapers.” ngoCHR.org was the only website cov- ering the Commission and the side Both Maria and Stefan are thinking of events extensively, including both official becoming journalists, and they enjoyed statements of the Commission and a lot of the experience very much. As a third- complementary information. It is very year student studying international law, important that all this information gets Stefan also discovered that reporting is known outside the Palais the Nations.” not all that easy. “It took a lot of time, because I do some research into the sub- Philippe was also very pleased with the Every day for six weeks in March and ject before I write,” he explained. At the large number of volunteers, which gave April, ICV’s volunteer reporters and edi- same time, the reports had to be written the reporters time to do separate inter- tors worked at the Palais des Nations in quickly, to keep the online news center, views as well, and write reports in dif- Geneva. Always enthusiastic and com- ngoCHR.org, up to date as far as possi- ferent languages (English, French and mitted, they delivered reports on the ble. Spanish). The only thing Philippe would daily meetings of the Commission as Stefan can rest assured: the volunteers want to improve is the geographical back- well as on numerous ‘side events’ organ- received great compliments, from their ground of the volunteers: it would be nice ized by non-governmental organizations editor Sarah Webborn for instance. She to have even more volunteers from Asia (NGOs) working on the protection of said that in general, the quality of the and Africa. With ICVolunteers expanding, human rights. And what a job it was. reports in English was very good. And that may be solved in the future. “I wrote reports on many different sub- from volunteer coordinator Philippe Oh, and perhaps another thing to think jects and learned a lot,” said Maria Dam of CONGO, the organization unit- about for next time: the volunteers Lazarte, who holds a degree in interna- ing NGOs affiliated to the UN, in collab- would have liked more opportunties to tional relations and anthropology from oration with whom ICVolunteers and meet their fellow volunteers and get to London and now lives in Geneva. “It was MCART set up the online news center. know each other. Their commitment my first time as a volunteer reporter and “Although many of them did not have a often kept them rushing past each other, I quite liked it.” One of the things she human rights background, the volun- they said. The few parties that were noticed in particular was the difference in teers showed the same interest and organized, were great fun. Well, with how the United Nations work (‘political commitment as our own interns and pleasure -- ICVolunteers is always ready negociations’), compared to NGOs whose employees and brought complementary to improve! (CS) N° 13, Second Quarter 2005 Volunteer News 5

VOLUNTEER REPORTERS BRING A FRESH PERSPECTIVE CONFERENCE REPORTING OVER THE YEARS

ICVolunteers’ conference reporters contribute an important element to a conference that many professional reporters have lost: tons of motivation and a fresh perspective. With nearly ten years of experience in bringing together non-prof- it organizations and volunteer reporters, ICVolunteers manages to satisfy both parties.

MCART. “Professional journalists are limited by the constraints of their field. They cannot always report everything the way they see it for fear of losing their job. Volunteer reporters, by contrast, are free to report objectively. If you know a lot about a subject, it can make you biased.” And when they are biased anyway (because it is very difficult not to be), the volunteers bring in a different perspective to the more experienced participants. “Volunteers help to pro- duce a more balanced picture,” says Rik. Let us not forget that the reporters would not be volunteering but for the fact that they possess valuable skills and are extremely interested in the job: many are students for whom it is an excellent way to take a look behind the It all started with the 12th World AIDS send delegates to every session, but still scenes of their future working field. Conference, in the late 90’s, when a want to be informed. Some organizations Without their participation, the job team of volunteer reporters worked do not even have the money to send any- would be impossible to do. hand in hand with InfoLink and MCART, one at all. The volunteer news service Randy of MCART: “I am always impressed in charge of the onsite reporting service, allows them to know what’s going on with the professionalism of the volun- covering the many sessions of the event. despite those constraints. teers. A little motivation goes a long That same partnership is now bringing Rik Panganiban, CONGO’s Communi- ways.” (VK/CS) ICV reporters together to cover the cations Coordinator, also points out that International Forum of Montreal in the volunteers commit to monitor entire Canada at the end of May, focusing on sessions, something NGO staff who global governance and democracy. come with very specific aims often can- CONFERENCE REPORTS This year was the third time already that not do, let alone professional journalists. ICV sent volunteer reporters to the “We can really rely on the volunteers,” A partnership program coordinated meeting of the UN Commission on Rik says. “In general, the volunteers are by ICVolunteers and MCART Human Rights in Geneva to work in eager to gain experience, and they have partnership with the Conference of a strong desire to be effective and follow • www.conference-reports.org NGOs in Consultative relationship with the instructions very well.” Past news services: the United Nations (CONGO). Most volunteers are no experts in the • IAVENews.org, August 2004, Over the years, ICVolunteers and subject matter of the conference at hand Barcelona, Spain MCART have developed an effective though, and sometimes their reports • ngoCHR.org, since 2004, reporting system and valuable experience need to be edited a little. That also Geneva, Switzerland serves a purpose, according to Rik: in training volunteer reporters to write • 4th Intl Conference on reports on conference sessions as well as “Some of our NGOs concentrate on Healthcare Resource Allocation articles and interviews. The volunteer field work or have limited experience for HIV/AIDS & Other Life- reporters provide the contents for an on- with the Commission on Human Rights Threatening Illnesses, October line news service, which can serve as the and need more background. Our chal- 2000, Cairo, Egypt basis for a final conference report in lenge is always to serve both expert and • Harm Reduction Conference, print or CD-ROM format as well. non-expert audiences and as volunteers March 1999, Geneva, often have the same questions as non- Switzerland Reporters do more than just provide experts, they are very helpful.” texts, although that is their core activity. • World AIDS Conference, July 1998, Geneva, Switzerland They fill in several important gaps. For The fresh perspective of the volunteers instance, NGOs that want to attend the actually are an important added value, Commission on Human Rights cannot points out Randy Schmieder, Director of 6 Volunteer News N° 13, Second Quarter 2005

FEEDBACK: TO BE PART OF THE ICV OFFICE TEAM... The volunteer team at the Geneva office is a critical part of ICVolunteers, without which the organization could not run. Long-term volunteers, taking on responsibility for membership services, fundraising, translation and more, help the organization in a significant way. Each year, ICVolunteers offers a number of internships, in particular in the field of trans- lation (specifically for English, French and Spanish). Louma Atallah and Caroline Daunes share their experience...

Louma Atallah, intern at the the confidence and encouragement of we did together. Moreover, the subjects ICVolunteers office from April to June Viola (ICV Director) and Kathy (ICV were always interesting, never forbid- 2004: “I did the internship to gain pro- Volunteer Coordinator). I have now just ding, and rich in content and substance. fessional experience. I was studying at finished my studies and am looking for Conclusion: fortunately, I have made a the ‘Ecole de traduction et d’interpréta- work.” good choice in the course of my studies! tion’ (ETI) in Geneva at the time. My job Caroline Daunes was an intern from was to translate the annual report of My computer skills, were not complete- October to December 2004. She stud- ly up to date when I started, where the ICVolunteers from English into French. ied English in Toulouse and finished her internship was very useful too. Some Was it useful? Yes very much so. The studies in Vancouver (Canada). Back in advice for colleagues: do not hesitate to experience gave me the opportunity to Europe, she decided to complement her ask when you are not sure about some- work quickly and efficiently on a long education with translation studies thing. For instance concerning the ter- project, taking into account the con- (French / English / German) at the ETI. minology used by international and non- straints which present themselves. Caroline: “I became an intern to be able governmental organizations. Internships Roughly, there were constraints of time, to work and translate for an extended are useful insofar as they allow you to quality, jargon of the field and the main period of time. I wanted to know if I use what you have learned at university idea one tries to transfer. I particularly would still like it after some time. What in a different context. It is useful for the enjoyed accomplishing a job from the I really appreciated was that René [a hosting organization as well as the transla- beginning to the end. And also the initia- longtime volunteer translator of ICV, tor, a win-win situation for everyone.” tives that ICVolunteers let me take, and ed.] reviewed my texts, and the work

PRIVATE SECTOR EXPERIENCE APPLIED TO THE NON-PROFIT SECTOR

Vijay Singh from India, was a volunteer at the ICV office until January this year. Armed with sales and marketing expe- rience, he helped to contact companies in Geneva to interest them in sponsorship for the CyberVolunteers Program. Vijay has now joined his wife and son in New York.

of volunteerism. In order to get inter- possibilities of forming a partnership to national conference exposure, I got support the program. Through the pro- involved in the World Summit on the gram, volunteers who specialize in infor- Information Society (i.e. the WSIS con- mation and communication technology ference in Geneva 2003, ed.), where I contribute to development projects volunteered for ICVolunteers. One thing with a special focus on the African region. led to another and I eventually became How do you rate your experience at part of the fundraising team of ICV, par- ICVolunteers? ticularly focusing on the private sector. Vijay (right) at the Hewlett Packard Great! It was a tremendous experience. How different was your volunteer work charity exhibition I truly enjoyed working in a field which I from previous jobs? only had encountered from a business How did you get involved in ICV? Before ICV I had been using my profes- perspective. Working at ICV also gave sional skills to facilitate sales and gener- me an opportunity to interact with and For the last eleven years or so of my ate business, following the norms of the learn from people with different back- professional career, I worked in sales in profession. Using my experience and grounds and experience. different countries. That gave me skills for community development with- opportunities to work and interact with out any ‘materialistic’ gain was sort of Would you be pursuing volunteerism in people from different geographical unusual to my mould! So my volunteer- the future? backgrounds. I moved to Switzerland ing was not only challenging but also an First of all, I am happy that I contributed from Kenya with my wife, who works opportunity to learn new dynamics of my time and experience to a project for the United Nations. Once in Geneva, interaction with people on a totally dif- that benefits Africa, where I lived for I used my so-called ‘sabbatical break’ to ferent level. almost eight years. Given the chance, I discover activities which probably would My role was primarily to initiate contacts would be happy to volunteer for the not have occurred to me otherwise. with the private sector to discuss the CyberVolunteers Program as a side One of them happened to be in the field CyberVolunteers Program and explore activity in the future. N° 13, Second Quarter 2005 Volunteer News 7

VOLUNTEERING IN IS DEVELOPMENT EXPLORING CYBERVOLUNTEERS AT THE CAPE TOWN VOLUNTEER CENTER

In December 2004, ICV way for them to actually educate them- and also showing what they are capable South Africa, hosted by selves is through volunteering. If young of. Jan, coordinator of an international the Cape Town Volunteer people get involved in volunteering, the youth program brought to South Africa by Center, organized a Center has the duty to make sure that Canada World Youth, stressed: “It is very meeting of the Civil Society Bureau they can develop their skills and learn important that whatever international of the World Summit on the new things.” program is being brought to South Africa, Information Society. It is now prepar- it helps to enhance local capacity and does Beverley, who is in charge of administra- ing to receive international cyber- under no circumstance put it at risk.” tion and project management, could not volunteers to focus on an HIV/AIDS agree more. “One of our successes is In light of all of this, the CyberVolunteers project. that we train volunteers here. We are Program will in particular focus on skills While South Africa has become the looking at volunteers with skills and transfer and capacity building in the United States of Africa for some since the those skills can be put to good use.” Cape Town region, and with the Cape end of apartheid, it still faces enormous Town Volunteer Center in particular. So can cyber-volunteers with specific social challenges: one of the world’s high- (VK) information and communication tech- est HIV/AIDS prevalence and unemploy- nology (ICT) skills help train volunteers ment among youth living in poor neigh- who are less familiar with computers borhoods, to name just a few. These are and technology? Deline van Boom, Volunteer News (English) the people the Volunteer Center is work- Director of the Volunteer Center, cer- ing for. During a visit to the Cape Town Editors tainly thinks so. “Our website is terribly office, we discussed cooperation in the Corine Schouten (CS), out of date, and I have given up on even CyberVolunteers Program. Viola Krebs (VK) mentioning it to anyone,” admits Deline. Photos Serving 300 member organizations In addition, the Center needs help with which bring together people form differ- updating its database and, more impor- Viola Krebs, Randy Schmieder, Kar Liang ent social backgrounds, origins and reli- tantly, with bringing up to speed the tech- gions, training volunteers is a core mis- nical skills of the volunteers. Students Translation sion for the Cape Town Volunteer from Cape Town do help with IT-related Marie Hervouet, Paul Seed Center. The aim: to improve the work work, but only when they have time -- Proofreading of the volunteers, obviously, but also to which is less than the Center needs. René Delétroz, Randy Schmieder, contribute to the development of South Kathy Monnier In a country that has many IT-skilled Africa. “We cannot see volunteering as people, one of the key conditions is that anything but developmental,” said ICVolunteers, PO Box 755 local cyber-volunteers work hand in Shaida, Recruitment Coordinator for the 1211 Geneva 4, Switzerland hand with internationals. In fact, for local Cape Town Volunteer Center. “Few volunteers it is a way of doing something ©2005 ICVolunteers young people can go to university, so one for their environment, gaining experience 8 Volunteer News N° 13, Second Quarter 2005

LOCAL LOOPS AND MICROWAVE LINKS About ICVolunteers ICVolunteers is a non-governmental VOLUNTEER SHAKES SAND OUT OF HIS KEYBOARD IN MALI organization that recruits, trains and coordinates volunteers for non-profit projects. The organization has three decentralization at the level of Mali’s main areas of activity: regions, towns and local associations. The most effective way identified to do • Mobilization of volunteers for social, humanitarian, environmen- this is to create a web portal grouping tal and scientific conferences; together all the documents and informa- tion necessary to encourage communi- • Coordination of projects linked to volunteer sending; ties to look for innovative ways of using local resources and to establish inter- • Promotion of volunteerism. communal and international partner- ICVolunteers works with a network of ships. I am also available to the 1,500 volunteers. To date, the organiza- Association for any technical assistance tion has carried out projects in Europe, related to their network and computer Africa and Asia and just opened a new systems, and have been given the task of office in Canada. In 2003, ICVolunteers studying the migration to a broadband worked with volunteers and volunteer organizations from 66 countries. internet connection. With a qualification in computer As the Focal Point of the WSIS Following the first project meeting to Volunteer Family, ICVolunteers coordi- engineering under his belt and look- introduce the Association’s portal proj- ing for some real-world experience, nates a series of activities linked to ect and the decentralization of Mali, I information and communication tech- young Tunisian Marouen Mraihi was given three weeks to translate the nologies. For more information see seized the opportunity to become a vision of the various partners in the proj- www.worldwidevolunteer.org. cyber-volunteer in Mali. He summa- ect into technical components and to Ongoing projects: rizes his first impressions as follows: prepare a work plan for the following months. • Reporting services for the UN “Everything is fine at the moment. I Commission and Sub-Commission admit that it took me some time to get For a computer scientist like me, the on Human Rights used to life in Mali which is different most striking technical aspect in Mali is • Organizing meetings for the from my home in North Africa. Above the extensive use of the radio frequency Landmine Survivors Network spectrum as the main support for com- all, the contact with people here has Offices given me a better understanding of local munication. This is visible in the number life and made my stay more pleasant. of local and regional radio stations and ICVolunteers Headquarters the size of their audiences, the fierce 104, rue de Carouge, PO Box 755 I work for the Mali Towns’ Association competition between the historical 1211 Geneva 4, Switzerland (Association des Municipalités du Mali or mobile telephone operator and the new ICVolunteers Mali AMM) which is participating in the exe- private operator, and the number of [email protected] cution phase of a process of decentral- Internet Service Providers sharing their ICVolunteres Congo-Brazzaville ization in the country. My main project is satellite connections to broadband sub- to help the Association in its mission to Azur Développement scribers via radio local loops and [email protected] promote the principles and benefits of microwave links.” ICVolunteers Senegal [email protected] ICVolunteers Canada (Montreal) ICV GETS CONSULTATIVE STATUS WITH THE UN [email protected] ICVolunteers South Africa ICVolunteers has recently obtained special consultative status with ECOSOC, the (Cape Town), The Volunteer Center Economic and Social Council of the United Nations. This is good news! It means [email protected] that ICVolunteers no longer has to go through an application procedure to attend international conferences convened by the UN, as well as the preparatory meet- Phone: +41 22 800 14 36 Fax: +41 22 800 14 37 ings of those conferences. In addition, ICV staff (i.e. Viola and Kathy) received badges for the UN, which makes looking for volunteer opportunities a lot easier. Email: [email protected] ECOSOC is the main organ of the United Nations to coordinate the economic and Web sites: social work of UN agencies and commissions. It is the central forum for discussing www.icvolunteers.org, international economic and social issues. ECOSOC consults with academics, busi- www.worldwidevolunteer.org ness sector representatives and more than 2,100 registered NGOs. (CS) http://cyber.icvolunteers.org