ICT for Empowering PWDs
The Egyptian Experience
Arab Republic of Egypt
Ministry of Communications
and Information Technology
Abeer Shakweer, Ph.D.,
Advisor to the Minister of Communications and
Information Technology for Social Services
1
WSIS – Geneva 29th May 2015
Content
ICT4PWDs’ strategy
Innovation in Accessibility Technology
Enhancing education and employment
through innovation
The Regional ICT Center for PwDs
2
Strategy framework
A diagram explains the strategy for ICT for People with Disabilities. The strategy is based on 3 basic layers which are the
infrastructure, Science Technology and Innovation, and Services. Three pillar will function based on those 3 layers. The pillars are
Education, training and employment. This will lead to the ultimate goal of developing an inclusive, empowering and participatory
society.
Innovation in Accessibility Technology
55 million Arabic speaking PWDs are challenged with
the lack of ICT based assistive technologies which
support the Arabic language
The Egyptian Ministry of ICT launched “Tamkeen”
Innovation competition for the development of software
and mobile applications for PWDs in 2012
4
Identifying the themes of the competition
A hearing impaired person contributing to identifying the themes of
Tamkeen competition
Running information sessions
Idea generation session to identify the themes of Tamkeen competition.
2 males and one female working on a white board to come up with the
specific needs for pwds.
Money reader mobile applications for
the visually impaired.
Now available
on play store
A visually impaired male using his mobile to read the currency and pay
at a café.
The unified educational sign language
digital dictionary
To help combating the challenge of differences in the
sign language
Welcome screen of the unified sign language digital dictionary
The deaf reader
Application translates from Arabic text to sign language
The version which translates from sign language to text
is now being
developed
Screen shot representing how text is translated into sign language
Fundamentals of the Arabic language
for the hearing impaired
Builds on the digital dictionary
Welcome screen of the program which teaches the Arabic language
fundamentals for the hearing impaired.
Touch typing program for the hearing
impaired
Builds on the digital dictionary and the Arabic language
fundamentals for the hearing impaired program
Welcome screen of the program which teaches touch typing for the
hearing impaired
Providing better education opportunities:
The 1000 schools for PwDs initiative
Graph for the number of inclusive and special education schools equipped with relevant equipment
and programs. 199 schools for the hearing impaired, 26 for the visually impaired, 35 inclusive
schools. A total of 260 schools
The unified educational sign language
digital dictionary
Now being distributed at the special schools for the hearing
impaired
Teachers are being trained on the digital dictionary
Students at a special girl’s schools for the hearing impaired using the
unified sign language digital dictionary
Fundamentals of the Arabic language
for the hearing impaired
Teacher woks with hearing impaired kids to explain the fundamentals
of the Arabic language for the hearing impaired
14
Providing better education opportunities:
The 1000 schools for PwDs initiative
A visually and cognitive impaired male student using a large screen
computer at a special school for the visually impaired
Training and qualifying for employment
Training for Employment
Graph introduces the number of People with Disabilities graduated and being trained through the ICDL grant and
the training for employment grant. For the ICDL grant, 129 were graduated and 237 are being trained. For the
training for employment grant, 210 were graduated, 250 are being trained and 152 were employed. The total
engaged in the 2 grants are 826.
Training and qualifying for employment
The touch typing program for the hearing impaired will
be used to qualify them as data entry
An employed visually impaired female working at a call center
Annual international conference and exhibition
Introduce the developed technologies
Feedback on the applications in the pipeline
Raise awareness of available technologies, programs
and grants
Minister of ICT and ITU vice president testing an application for
People with visual disabilities at the exhibition.
Annual international conference and exhibition
Youth with hearing disabilities explain their developed
robot to help people with Alzheimer
2 female youth and one male show how their robot follow
special roots to guide people with Alzheimer indoors
Annual international conference and exhibition
Prime minister listening to 3 people with disabilities at the conference
The Regional ICT Center for PwDs
February 2014: Egypt announced its strategy to launch a
regional ICT center for PwDs
March 2014: at the WTDC, the ICT accessibility for PwDs
initiative was announced as one of the 5 initiatives of the
Arab Region
December 2014: Arab ICT ministers blessed the proposa
at their ministerial meeting held under the umbrella of the
League of Arab States
21
The Regional ICT Center for PwDs
April 2015, the ministry announced the launch of the
center as a partnership project between the ITU and
MCIT
Dr. Abeer Shakweer with Mr. Houlin Zhao the Secretary general of the ITU
The Regional ICT Center for PwDs
Developing ICT Accessibility
Policies and Strategies
Developing
ICT based
assistive
technologies
which support
the Arabic
language
23
Capacity
building for
ICT designer
and
developers in
the area of
ICT
accessibility
Advising
Governments
and other
entities in ICT
accessibility
affairs
Thank you
www.tamkeen.gov.eg
24