Our mission To improve the lives of the people of the emerging Asia-Pacific by facilitating their use of ICTs and related infrastructures; by catalyzing the reform of laws, policies and regulations to enable those uses through the conduct of policy-relevant research, training and advocacy with emphasis on building in-situ expertise Contents CEO’s message 03 About LIRNEasia 09 Review of activities 17 Financial statements 45 © LIRNEasia Published in 2011 by LIRNEasia 12 Balcombe Place Colombo 8, Sri Lanka CEO’s message 30 Print Web/Blog 25 20 15 10 5 Number of published articles 0 Bangladesh India Pakistan Sri Lanka Thailand Unspecified CEO’s message L I R N E a s i a | Annual Report 2010-11 3 CEO’s message L I R N E a s i a | Annual Report 2010-11 4 CEO’s message In 2010, LIRNEasia commenced its 4th country, and indeed in a region of that surveillance program covers the Siva- research cycle, supported by a two-year country. She also had credibility from having ganga District in the State of Tamil Nadu grant from the International Development served a few years back as Director Gen- of India and the Kurunegala District in Research Centre of Canada and UKaid eral of the Tertiary and Vocation Education the Wayamba Province of Sri Lanka. He from the Department for International De- Commission of Sri Lanka. Over the three lives and works in Kunming, in the Yunnan velopment of the United Kingdom. As in and half years of the project she built the Province of China. His project involves previous years, the research component relationships and the credibility necessary to the use of mobile phones and a highly au- has three modules, one on demand-side institutionalize the findings of her action- tonomous self-improving software system research (Teleuse at the bottom of the research project on knowledge to innova- for data mining called T-Cube. He seeks pyramid 4), one that further developed tion processes in government. The fact to improve the scope and speed of epide- the supply-side indicators work we had that she was recently invited to serve as miological data collection and the ability to started doing in 2006, and a third thematic the National Coordinator of the Federation identify patterns that can foretell the emer- area focused on knowledge and informa- of Sri Lanka Local Government Authorities gence of infectious or non-infectious dis- tion gaps in agricultural value chains. The (FSLGA), an association of local govern- eases in specific locations. Nuwan had to overall proposal is entitled “Innovations for ment bodies formed in the aftermath of the navigate two government bureaucracies inclusive knowledge-based economies in 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami by the Fed- to implement the project. With the help emerging Asia: Research, dissemination eration of Canadian Municipalities (FCM), of Professor Ashok Jhunjhunwala in India and advocacy by LIRNEasia.” is evidence of her success. and Dr. Vinya Ariyaratne in Sri Lanka, he did. Then he had to communicate the rich This proposal marked a major shift in Nuwan Waidyanatha is a mathematician, findings of the pilot to the key decision LIRNEasia’s research focus and the audi- not a physician. His project real-time bio- ences we address. We had done a little bit of pilot research on agriculture in 2006- 08, and a few small projects funded by a collaboration between the International Fund for Agricultural Development and the International Development Research Centre (ENRAP) and USAID (Connecting Regional Economies Program), all in Sri Lanka. But ICT infrastructure was always center stage. With the proposal submitted in 2010, agriculture came to the fore. Research has commenced on agriculture in four countries and we are grappling with the challenges of disseminating the find- ings to audiences we have never reached out to before. The advantages we have with telecom audiences who have inter- acted with LIRNEasia for six years and with me for over a decade are absent when we venture into applications. Similar challenges faced the directors of Sujata Gamage at the launching ceremony of Nuwan Waidyanatha speaking at the real- the projects on knowledge to innovation National Competency Standards for Municipal time bio-surveillance program media event, (K2I) and real-time bio-surveillance pro- Solid Waste Operation Assistant, 29 June 2010 14 September 2010, Colombo, Sri Lanka gram (RTBP). Sujata Gamage had the at Bandaranayaike Center for International advantage of working in a single, small Studies, Sri Lanka L I R N E a s i a | Annual Report 2010-11 5 CEO’s message makers in the health bureaucracies in two One of the key recommendations to Abu Saeed initiated a push to address countries and to the media. This too was emerge from the 3rd cycle research was a core problem affecting broadband ac- successfully done. The mobile-based sys- the importance of creating low-transac- cess in Asia, the high cost of international tem is now operational in the Wayamba tion-cost environments for mobile appli- backhaul in Asia, relative to Europe and Province, even after the end of the project. cations including the offering of standard North America. His solution is the laying reasonable revenue-share contracts to of terrestrial fiber along the Asian Highway So we draw inspiration from the success- applications developers. At the Islamabad as a supplement to the existing undersea ful dissemination efforts of the K2I and event, a CEO of a major Pakistani mobile cables serving Asia. LIRNEasia has been RTBP projects, as we move forward to the operator (Zong [China Mobile Pakistan]) engaging with the UN Economic and So- dissemination phase of the 4th cycle of re- made a public commitment to offer stan- cial Commission for the Asia Pacific (ES- search. dard contracts to applications developers. CAP) which has authority over the Asian We did not track whether the commitment Highway since September 2010 and has Of course, our research is not limited to had been kept, but were gratified on re- succeeded in getting the topic on the applications. We still do a substantial turn to see that a Sri Lankan software firm policy agendas of ESCAP, the Asia Pa- amount of research that is of relevance (hSenid), in collaboration with Etisalat, an- cific Telecommunity (APT) and the Inter- to telecom policymakers, regulators and nouncing exactly what we recommended national Telecommunication Union (ITU). senior managers of telecom operators. at the Expert forum in Pakistan. The App The progress made so far leaves us hope- In April 2010, LIRNEasia conducted a Zone is an unique platform that allows for ful that Abu Saeed will be able to repeat major stakeholder dissemination event in the testing and marketing of mobile appli- the (undocumented) catalytic role that he Pakistan in collaboration with the Pakistan cations for feature phones which still pre- played in getting Bangladesh connected Telecom Authority. Here, we presented dominate at the BOP. to SEA-ME-WE 4 in 2005. Abu Saeed will the research findings of the 3rd cycle of continue as Senior Policy Fellow in his research that looked at the preconditions LIRNEasia’s Senior Policy Fellow Abu personal capacity and will keep his AM- for the emergence of more-than-voice ser- Saeed Khan was appointed as the first TOB activities separate. We wish him well. vices of relevance to those at the bottom Secretary General of the Association of of the pyramid (BOP). The event was held Mobile Telecom Operators of Bangladesh in Islamabad, but was attended by repre- (AMTOB) in August. AMTOB has been ex- sentatives of regulatory agencies from the istence for some time, but this is the first region as well as media personnel from time a full-time executive was appointed afar. It generated coverage in Thailand to coordinate its activities. The appoint- and India, among other places. ment came at a challenging time, as the licenses of three major mobile operators come up for renewal. 30 Print Web/Blog 25 20 15 Figure 1: Media coverage 10 (print and web/blog) by country of the Expert forum Abu Saeed Khan, Senior Policy Fellow 5 meeting on “Mobile 2.0 of LIRNEasia and Secretary General of the Number of published articles Applications and Condi- Association of Mobile Telecom Operators 0 tions”, 26-27 April 2010, of Bangladesh Bangladesh India Pakistan Sri Lanka Thailand Unspecified Islamabad, Pakistan L I R N E a s i a | Annual Report 2010-11 6 CEO’s message LIRNEasia focused its corporate social The previously announced departure of responsibility initiatives by launching the Senior Research Manager Chanuka Wat- Annual LIRNEasia Disaster Risk Reduc- tegama occurred in August 2010. He is an tion lecture in July 2010. The first lecture independent consultant in telecom and was delivered by Dr. Vinya Ariyaratne, the continues to work with LIRNEasia as Re- General Secretary of the Sarvodaya Sh- search Fellow. Anusha Wickramaratne, ramadana Movement, Sri Lanka’s larg- Junior Researcher, left LIRNEasia end of est community-based organization with a March 2011 to join government service. strong profile in responding to disasters. We wish them both well. Vinya has served on the board of LIRNEasia from the outset and I advise Sarvodaya Juhee Kang, a PhD student from Michigan on ICT matters. LIRNEasia has partnered State University originally from Korea and with Sarvodaya on many projects in the with significant field experience in Asia, disaster risk reduction space since 2005 joined LIRNEasia for six months under the and continues to channel its corporate CPRsouth internship program at the be- philanthropy through Sarvodaya, most re- ginning of 2011. cently during the twin floods that ravaged the North and East of the country in Janu- The LIRNEasia family continues to grow ary 2011.