Records management and ICTs

Abstract

The main focus of this issue is on Africa; but we begin with a look at developing countries in general, and end with a paper on Bangladesh. The first paper, ‘Institutional and societal innovations in information technology for developing countries’, by Jeffrey James of Tilburg University, considers the impact of local innovation in IT in developing countries, which is based on various forms of sharing which benefit low-income groups. The paper emphasizes the sharing of mobile phones as the most potent source of spreading information technology in developing countries. The next paper, ‘Advancing HIV/AIDS combination prevention through mass media: a review of practices in sub-Saharan Africa’, by Mesfin Awoke Bekalu and Steven Eggermont of Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, presents an assessment of the literature on the use of mass media campaigns to advance biomedical, structural and behavioural approaches to HIV/AIDS prevention in sub-Saharan Africa over the past decade. The findings suggest that the mass media seem to have focused mainly on behavioural interventions – a limitation which calls for serious attention. As in much of the rest of the world, the use of electronic records is becoming increasingly common in Africa, and the third paper in this issue, by Trywell Kalusopa and Patrick Ngulube of the University of South Africa, deals with this topic in the context of Botswana. In ‘Developing an e-records readiness framework for labour organizations in Botswana’, the authors surveyed all 50 registered labour organizations in Botswana and established that e-records readiness in these organizations reflected slow adoption of ICTs, inadequate records management standards and practices and low integration in the national e-readiness framework. The paper recommends actions to be taken to ensure the integration of labour organizations into the information and knowledge society in Botswana. Nigeria is the focus of the next paper, ‘The effect of extrinsic and intrinsic motivation on knowledge sharing intentions of civil servants in Ebonyi State, Nigeria’, by Wole Olatokun and Chinazom Irene Nwafor of the University of Ibadan. Adopting a modified Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) as their approach, the authors conclude that extrinsic motivation does not have a significant effect on the knowledge sharing intentions of the employees of the Ebonyi State Civil Service Commission; the main motivating factors in knowledge sharing are enjoyment in helping others and knowledge self-efficacy. The authors recommend that organizations place more emphasis on intrinsic motivation, enhance knowledge sharing facilities and create a feedback system to increase employees’ knowledge selfefficacy. We leave Africa for Asia in the final paper in this issue. In ‘Students’ perceptions of academic use of social networking sites: a survey of university students in Bangladesh’, Israt Jahan of United International University and S.M. Zabed Ahmed of the University of Dhaka report the results of a survey on the perceptions of academic use of social networking sites by students of the University of Dhaka. The results show that the students have a positive attitude towards academic use of such sites, although there are some differences in their opinions. The differences are largely due to the fact that the use of these sites in academic contexts is not well-defined. Academic institutions need to devise policies and strategies on the use of social networking sites to support education and learning beyond the classroom.