DadaabNet Project Report March 2014 “The customer is always right” An unprecedented drought and famine across Somalia, coupled with the long-standing civil war, resulted in a massive influx of refugees to Dadaab1, Kenya during the summer of 2011 and throughout 2012. The refugee camp’s population spiked from 300,000 to well over 500,000, resulting in a need for humanitarian organizations to quickly ramp up operations. Given that Dadaab grew has enabled shared resources, to over five times the number of collaborative communications refugees it was originally designed and response efforts, and an array for, there were infrastructure “When disaster strikes, of workforce and community inadequacies and essential service the immediate needs are development programs. Access to capacity and logistical challenges obvious: food, water, shelter DadaabNet has also been extended — all of which could be offset by and medical supplies, but to refugee youth, presenting an better connectivity. none of these necessities invaluably empowering opportunity reach survivors without Recognizing this critical need, over for education and vocational a robust communication 16 organizations came together training, and, for some, a first network to enable relief behind an initiative to deliver high- chance to connect to the outside workers to save lives.” speed, low-cost Internet access world. It may soon provide many Lynda Kigera, Save the via an innovative and replicable with their first access to health care Children network model. With the successful through Tele-Health technologies implementation of DadaabNet, aid and virtual access to Doctors. agencies in Dadaab were provided Project Overview with the reliable access needed to improve operations and save lives. In August 2011, USAID asked NetHope’s Global The high-speed local area network Broadband and Innovations team to develop a connectivity solution to address the immediate 1 Dadaab is situated in a remote arid region of eastern Kenya close to the Somalia border in Garissa County. 1 needs and attract local service providers to ensure assessment and proposal was documented and sustainability and scalability. Utilizing funding from shared. NetHope members and technology Cisco, USAID, Microsoft and others, NetHope and partners were engaged up-front to conduct peer networking partners Cisco Systems and Inveneo review and recommendations. The following were able to develop an innovative approach to impacts are the results of the implementation of bring affordable and reliable Internet connectivity the findings. to Dadaab and build an infrastructure network throughout the refugee camp. Major Impacts of DadaabNet As thousands of refugees crossed the border 1. A High-Speed Local Network to Support Many view the from Somalia, the number of response agencies Relief Operations. Established competitive and and humanitarian workers increased, expanding reliable shared terrestrial connectivity for the implementation of inter-organizational information sharing and humanitarian organizations and community. DadaabNet as the first scalability requirements. Bringing broadband Connectivity savings will be measured in the bridge to creating a more improvements to Dadaab started effectively hundreds of thousands in the first two years peaceful environment in with early engagement of the local stakeholder as agencies transfer their business operations Dadaab. community to co-create an innovative network from VSAT to terrestrial. architecture, business model and support plan. 2. Support for Refugee Community and “Without having this sort Developing trusted relationships and delivering Youth. Connected five times the number of connectivity among the solution-specific practical training and localized of locations for beneficiaries/refugees than NGOs, among the youth, engagements in the initial network implementation originally committed in addition to entire NGO were key elements to ensure successful service community for operations & joint collaborative we could not make it where introductions and ongoing operations. Kenyan communications. Hundreds of youth have we are today....I’d love my telecommunications companies Orange and gained access to Internet based training and children to have peace... Safaricom, with support from local technology resources in the first few months; this number peace and a promising life.” experts Dimension Data and Setright, were enlisted is expected to increase into the tens of Abdikadir Farah, Dadaab as full partners early in the process and invited thousands in the next 12 months and to exceed to participate in engineering and business peer a hundred thousand in year two. Resident review. Preferred reduced pricing and additional 3. Connectivity Savings. Twenty (20) times capacity based on demand aggregation and reduction in recurring WAN connectivity projections were negotiated prior to the onset of expense than previously available (VSAT vs. the project. terrestrial pricing), with greater reliability, Critical Success Factor 1: Prior to solutions redundancy and resiliency. development, requirements were gathered in 4. A Sustainable Network with an Indefinite Dadaab from 17 NGO/UN agencies. A connectivity Lifeline. Enabled local ownership, support and 2 future development of the Dadaab services. and relevant information, supply line logistics This capacity was developed by pre-qualifying and situation/security reports. If connectivity is and training local agency ICT staff to provide limited, then information sharing is also limited and first-tier support and diagnostics; improving collaboration and responsiveness are impeded. response time to service needs; and increasing the ICT talents of the local workforce. The primary goals for Phase 1 were to: 5. A Reliable, Scalable Voice and Video Solution. 1. Increase available reliable, affordable terrestrial Established a reliable data voice and video connectivity and choices of providers. solution for the humanitarian agencies and 2. Establish a high-speed reliable local the community. NetHope worked with Cisco collaboration network (DadaabNet). and Inveneo to ensure the scalability and replicability for other rural areas and refugee With an existing local tower infrastructure and camps. the cluster of humanitarian organizations, it was easy to understand how a shared high-speed 6. Educational Opportunities to Refugees. local network could be highly and quickly utilized Through partnership with Norwegian Refugee amongst the various agencies involved. Council Youth Education Pack, five centers were connected that offer high school and In March 2012, a high-speed local area network, college level diplomas through NRC online DadaabNet, along with integrated affordable programs. This was the first step in the terrestrial Internet services and VSAT failover camps’ history to connect refugees to the configurations were designed and implemented as skills and knowledge needed for professional development and growth. Dadaab Phase 1 Humanitarian compounds and offices are clustered within a 2km radius of each other in a secured compound in Dadaab. An opportunity to establish shared connectivity services and collaborative support for the humanitarian community based [photo left] Trainees on proximity was realized very early in the from Orange Kenya, requirements gathering phase. The NGO and Inveneo ICIP, Setright, and Dadaab-based UN agencies operating in Dadaab asserted that IT staffs assemble an the key to a well-coordinated response to the Ubiquiti Rocket Dish. massive influx of refugees was access to timely 3 DadaabNet Phase 1. Critical Success Factor 2: DadaabNet became a catalyst for interagency IT collaboration, information sharing and problem solving in Dadaab. PHASE 1 RESULTS: 1. Provided Multiple Broadband Services to Dadaab. Increased the reliability of service to Dadaab by providing high-speed dual path, multi-vendor terrestrial connectivity with diversity and redundancy to enable mission and technical support. The combination of [photo above] Trainees critical applications and improve camp additional in-kind and direct donations enabled are under Inveneo’s CTO Andris Bjornson’s operations. the technical and program management guidance, to learn safe 2. Reduced Internet Costs. Negotiated reductions support needed to successfully complete, climbing techniques on in the cost of terrestrial connectivity by expand and sustain the implementation. 50-meter towers. approximately $500 per month per Mb by 5. Ensured Sustainability of Network. Enabled partnering with both Orange and Safaricom scalable capacity to ensure a reliable network to provide more diverse and reliable network and repeatable, innovative and cost-effective connectivity and increase bandwidth capacity last mile architecture. This was done through by 50Mb. the training of technically prequalified Orange 3. Introduced Back-Up Internet Connections. and Dadaab ICT staff in Inveneo technologies Maintained VSAT as fail-over in the design and (Ubiquiti) and Cisco routing and switching configuration provided by Cisco and Inveneo in configurations. Newly trained engineers were order to ensure continuous up-time and have also included on the installation team side- third-tier redundancy to the mission critical by-side with Ubiquiti experts from Inveneo network while still reducing cost per Mb used. & local partner Setright and Cisco’s certified local technology partner Dimension Data (with 4. Leveraged Resources and Donations from remote configuration support from Cisco). Multiple