Project of UN agency and Microsoft to bring computer training to refugee camps
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and software giant Microsoft Corp. signed an agreement today in Geneva that will bring training and computer education for refugees in camps located in Kenya and the Russian Federation.
The Community Technology Learning Centres (CTLC), which will be fully funded by Microsoft, will be located at Dadaab refugee camp in eastern Kenya, which hosts more than 100,000 mainly Somali refugees, and in St. Petersburg, to benefit more than 6,000 mainly Afghans and Iraqis.
“Refugee youth will be targeted under the training programme that will give them contact with the latest software and hardware, giving them new perspective on the broader world and skills they can eventually use,” Ron Redmond, a spokesman for UNHCR, said at a briefing in Geneva.
The curriculum being developed covers basic information technology skills and literacy, focussing on software applications such as word processing, databases and spreadsheets that can be used in a variety jobs once the refugees are repatriated or settle in the host country.
The agreement was signed on the margins of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) and brought about with help from the UN Fund for International Partnerships (UNFIP), which serves as “a sort of marriage broker” of high-impact programmes and projects and innovative partnerships between UN organizations and civil society in furtherance of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), UNFIP Executive Director Air Dossal said.
“We encouraged [Microsoft] to reach out to UNHCR again,” he said, noting that the software company had previously collaborated with the UN agency during the Kosovo crisis in 1999, when it developed portable registration kits for UNHCR.
The Fund ? the interface between Ted Turner's UN Foundation (UNF) and the UN system ? provides “one-stop shopping” for partnership opportunities with the UN family and facilitates access to the UN system, including by providing advice on UN processes, best practices and lessons learned, Mr. Dossal added.