TED Talks-Paul Conneally: Digital humanitarianism

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Transcript:


The humanitarian model has barely changedsince the early 20th century.Its origins are firmly rootedin the analog age.And there is a major shift coming on the horizon.The catalyst for this changewas the major earthquake that struck Haition the 12th of January in 2010.Haiti was a game changer.The earthquake destroyed the capital of Port-au-Prince,claiming the lives of some 320,000 people,rendering homelessabout 1.2 million people.Government institutions were completely decapitated,including the presidential palace.I remember standingon the roof of the Ministry of Justicein downtown Port-au-Prince.It was about two meters high,completely squashedby the violence of the earthquake.

For those of us on the ground in those early days,it was clear for even the most disaster-hardened veteransthat Haiti was something different.Haiti was something we hadn't seen before.But Haiti provided us with something else unprecedented.Haiti allowed us to glimpse into a futureof what disaster response might look likein a hyper-connected worldwhere people have accessto mobile smart devices.

Because out of the urban devastationin Port-au-Princecame a torrent of SMS texts --people crying for help,beseeching us for assistance,sharing data, offering support,looking for their loved ones.This was a situationthat traditional aid agencies had never before encountered.We were in one of the poorest countries on the planet,but 80 percent of the peoplehad mobile devices in their hands.And we were unprepared for this,and they were shaping the aid effort.

Outside Haiti also, things were looking different.Tens of thousands of so-called digital volunteerswere scouring the Internet,converting tweetsthat had already been converted from textsand putting these into open-source maps,layering them with all sorts of important information --people like Crisis Mappers and Open Street Map --and putting these on the Web for everybody --the media, the aid organizations and the communities themselves --to participate in and to use.

Back in Haiti,people were increasingly turningto the medium of SMS.People that were hungry and hurtingwere signaling their distress,were signaling their need for help.On street sides all over Port-au-Prince,entrepreneurs sprung upoffering mobile phone charging stations.They understood more than we didpeople's innate needto be connected.

Never having been confrontedwith this type of situation before,we wanted to try and understandhow we could tap into this incredible resource,how we could really leveragethis incredible use of mobile technologyand SMS technology.We started talking with a local telecom provider called Voilà,which is a subsidiary of Trilogy International.We had basically three requirements.We wanted to communicatein a two-way form of communication.We didn't want to shout; we needed to listen as well.We wanted to be able to targetspecific geographic communities.We didn't need to talk to the whole country at the same time.And we wanted it to be easy to use.

Out of this rubble of Haiti and from this devastationcame something that we call TERA --the Trilogy Emergency Response Application --which has been used to support the aid effortever since.It has been used to help communities prepare for disasters.It has been used to signal early warningin advance of weather-related disasters.It's used for public health awareness campaignssuch as the prevention of cholera.And it is even used for sensitive issuessuch as building awarenessaround gender-based violence.

But does it work?We have just publishedan evaluation of this program,and the evidence that is there for all to seeis quite remarkable.Some 74 percent of peoplereceived the data.Those who were intended to receive the data,74 percent of them received it.96 percent of themfound it useful.83 percent of them took action --evidence that it is indeed empowering.And 73 percent of them shared it.

The TERA systemwas developed from Haitiwith support of engineers in the region.It is a user-appropriate technologythat has been used for humanitarian good to great effect.Technology is transformational.Right across the developing world,citizens and communitiesare using technologyto enable them to bring about change, positive change,in their own communities.The grassroots has been strengthenedthrough the social power of sharingand they are challenging the old models,the old analog modelsof control and command.

One illustration of the transformational power of technologyis in Kibera.Kibera is one of Africa's largest slums.It's on the outskirts of Nairobi,the capital city of Kenya.It's home to an unknown number of people --some say between 250,000and 1.2 million.If you were to arrive in Nairobi todayand pick up a tourist map,Kibera is representedas a lush, green national parkdevoid of human settlement.

Young people living in Kiberain their community,with simple handheld devices,GPS handheld devices and SMS-enabled mobile phones,have literally put themselves on the map.They have collated crowd-sourced dataand rendered the invisible visible.People like Josh and Steveare continuing to layer information upon information,real-time information, Tweet it and text it onto these mapsfor all to use.You can find out about the latest impromptu music session.You can find out about the latest security incident.You can find out about places of worship.You can find out about the health centers.You can feel the dynamismof this living, breathing community.They also have their own news network on YouTubewith 36,000 viewers at the moment.

They're showing us what can be donewith mobile, digital technologies.They're showing that the magic of technologycan bring the invisible visible.And they are giving a voice to themselves.They are telling their own story,bypassing the official narrative.

And we're seeing from all points on the globe similar stories.In Mongolia for instance,where 30 percent of the people are nomadic,SMS information systems are being usedto track migration and weather patterns.SMS is even usedto hold herder summitsfrom remote participation.And if people are migratinginto urban, unfamiliar, concrete environments,they can also be helped in anticipationwith social supporters ready and waiting for thembased on SMS knowledge.In Nigeria,open-source SMS toolsare being used by the Red Cross community workersto gather information from the local communityin an attempt to better understand and mitigatethe prevalence of malaria.My colleague, Jason Peat, who runs this program,tells me it's 10 times faster and 10 times cheaperthan the traditional way of doing things.

And not only is it empowering to the communities,but really importantly,this information stays in the communitywhere it is needed to formulate long-term health polices.We are on a planetof seven billion people,five billion mobile subscriptions.By 2015,there will be three billion smartphones in the world.The U.N. broadband commissionhas recently set targetsto help broadband accessin 50 percent of the Developing World,compared to 20 percent today.We are hurtling towards a hyper-connected worldwhere citizens from all cultures and all social stratawill have access to smart, fast mobile devices.

People are understanding,from Cairo to Oakland,that there are new ways to come together,there are new ways to mobilize,there are new ways to influence.A transformation is coming which needs to be understoodby the humanitarian structures and humanitarian models.The collective voices of peopleneeds to be more integrated through new technologiesinto the organizational strategies and plans of actionsand not just recycledfor fundraising or marketing.We need to, for example, embracethe big data,the knowledge that is there from market leaderswho understand what it meansto use and leverage big data.

One idea that I'd like you to consider, for instance,is to take a look at our IT departments.They're normally backroom or basement hardware service providers,but they need to be elevated to software strategists.We need people in our organizationswho know what it's like to work with big data.We need technologyas a core organizational principle.We need technological strategists in the boardroomwho can ask and answer the question,"What would Amazon or Googledo with all of this data?"and convert it to humanitarian good.

The possibilitiesthat new digital technologies are bringingcan help humanitarian organizations,not only ensurethat people's right to information is met,or that they have their right to communicate,but I think in the future,humanitarian organizations will also have to anticipatethe right for people to accesscritical communication technologiesin order to ensurethat their voices are heard,that they're truly participating,that they're truly empowered in the humanitarian world.It has always been the elusive idealto ensure full participation of people affected by disastersin the humanitarian effort.We now have the tools. We now have the possibilities.There are no more reasons not to do it.I believe we need to bring the humanitarian worldfrom analog to digital.

Thank you very much.

(Applause)