The day for Sarwat Hussain Naqvi, the sector coordinator with UNDP NACO, Raipur, has just begun. Meeting a few key people in the office and pushing some files to the head office are a few routine jobs he has to get over with. Then comes the most interesting hour of the day ? an hour when he forgets about problems and concentrates on their solutions. An established thinker and practitioner on HIV/AIDS, health and nutrition today, the development professional has ideas that may do wonders for the country?s social burdens. And, if his ideas fail to deliver, he goes on meeting people in the neighbourhood ? even those at the grassroots ? to help him with a few solutions.
?All one has to do is to participate and reply to a query posted by someone in the group. The replies must make us brainstorm online and help us with solutions. All these have to be done in 15 days. After that, we have to log on to another problem posted,? says the Chattisgarh-based member of United Nations? Solution Exchange.
Today, with about 12,000 active thinkers and contributors from nook and corner of the country, Solutions Exchange, the mega knowledge management programme of the world body, has been helping India find its own solutions through information and communication technologies (ICTs). So falling prey to another cyclone in Orissa, accepting gender exploitation at the workplace, dying of AIDS with no security for the kids one is leaving behind may not be a fate you have to resign yourself to. It only requires thinking, finding ways out, speaking up and implementing.
Now in its third year, Solution Exchange (www.solutionexchange-un.net.in) offers communities of development practitioners a forum where they can provide and benefit from each other?s solutions to day-to-day challenges.
The communities, organised around selected development targets derived from the Five Year Plan and globally mandated Millennium Development Goals, address issues within 10 broad themes of AIDS, decentralisation, education, environment (water, sustainable environment, clean technologies), food and nutrition security, gender, health (maternal, child and public), poverty (work and employment, microfinance), ICT for development and disaster management. The initiative, launched in March 2005, once rich with positive result, would be implemented in other Saarc nations, informs the UN.
The members of Solution Exchange come from all walks of life ? government, NGOs, development partners, the private sector, academia, etc ? to interact on an ongoing basis, trust and strengthen their identity as a group on a query posted by anyone who is part of the system. Besides the virtual discussions, the initiative also organises periodical face-to-face meetings of the members to give a face to the programme.
A buzzing web of solutions
For TR Raghunandan, joint secretary, Ministry of Panchayati Raj, the association with Solution Exchange has been a fruitful involvement ? away from all rambling talks one has to live with in the blog age. A person who prefers the internet to TV and newspaper to get the latest in the world, Raghunandan thinks ICT is a tool that can empower panchayats in a big way. Satisfied with the way the initiative is moderated by the best of minds in the topic themes, he is now working on an ICT initiative similar to or even better than Solution Exchange for the ministry.
For VK Jain, director,?Ambuja Cement Foundation, the experience of working with Solution Exchange on AIDS in Ahmedabad has been more than wonderful. The foundation had organised a meet of AIDS workers and thinkers in the city once. The results: ?vivid,? says Jain. ?Today ,working on AIDS at 17 locations in 11 states, we are left with different problems in taming the HIV. The meeting helped us with some ways to counter a few of these difficulties. We have had good discussions on awareness, prevention, treatment, counselling and making newer income-generating ways for the affected. We now look forward to another such meeting, which can make us look in and out on the same topic,? he says.
If the story of social development has been happy for both public and corporate sectors, it could be happier. For Prema Ramachandran, director, Nutrition Foundation of India, the relaxed ambience generated through dialogue has led to purse strings being loosened. ?On our mission of providing school children key nutrients, the mid-day meal programme was supposed to include vegetables. The suggestion was taken up by Iskcon ? which runs a good mid-day meal programme in the Capital ? and was helped by Mother Dairy with vegetables at discounted rates. New and interesting suggestions at Solution Exchange are also picked by corporates to help them fulfill their social responsibility missions,? says the lady, who, with more corporates following, cannot ask for more.
Real-time challenges
For Anand Kumar, coordinator, Solution Exchange, there are few challenges to address still. Beginning with a more robust web portal, ways to tame the language barrier among Indian states, add more communities on topics like clean technologies and urban issues, establishing a deep ICT network and encouraging people to stick to it, there are a few problems that come exclusive to its member sections.
A corporate, while working a solution to a problem, may want to keep the consensus reached exclusive. This usually comes when it sees a good business sense in an idea. ?But this is not the way Solution Exchange operates. We ensure that the discussion ? moderated well to cut on bad language and people rambling ? is documented for public use. Then there are delays and not-so-prompt attitude among a few of the participants. But now with moods changing, we think the programme will overcome these challenges too.?
With India struggling with problems much beyond the 10 themes chosen by Solution Exchange, it becomes the moral duty of each Indian, especially those with easy access to ICTs, to be part of it. After all, a positive attitude is a solution in itself.
