Access Point Project: Education & Earning solution for the Poor

[Peace Portal]

Access Points are community centers in locations globally that connect individual users with Information Age options for accessing free education, global marketplaces, social interaction with other cultures, and a space for earning wealth where everyone receives equal compensation for their labor.

Peace Portal partners, and those supported by the Peace Portal Humanitarian Trust through endowments, grants, or purchases of equipment, such as PlayPumps International water merry go rounds, One Laptop per Child computers, Aprovecho "Rocket Stoves", Inveneo, ICT systems, and Room to Read computer classrooms allow for an integrated plan to cooperatively:

* Develop buildings with computers, clean energy, and staff;
* Create a school for kids and adults in the computer room;
* Offer a place to exchange locally made goods or services using "credit";
* Provide health care access with tele-medicine technology;
* Install Information & Communication Technologies (ICTs); and
* Connect projects and beneficiaries on the ground with the entire Peace Portal collective of partners and beneficiaries.

Access Points provide a viable means for those in the 3rd world tin particular to develop out of poverty by accessing the global marketplace (utilizing the FDU commerce platform) where they can get Information Age jobs, with equal compensation for their labor.

To address economic growth of those living in poverty, particularly in emerging markets where the majority of people subsist on less than $2.00 a day, and for them to grow without further depleting the natural resources of their local eco-systems, will require something entirely new - access to the Information Age.

In the Information Age the poor will no longer be confined to creating wealth from their dwindling local natural resources, now their knowledge and ideas become the basis for value Value that is imported into their community, most likely by those most comfortable with new things, the kids. Kids using computers today will in the future (when they have a payment mechanism) begin to earn by selling artwork for brochures to corporations, take programming jobs, self-publish culturally unique digital how-to videos and music albums, they will offer consultation, market affiliate products and much more.

With access to the global marketplace new vistas of educational and commercial potential become available. Support, training, and services for accessing digital wealth in local goods and services will be need to supplement technology.

Through a Co-operative or Mutual Benefit Association for example, only a few need to know how to use computers; craftsmen or farmers can drop off their goods to the Co-op for sales, the digital wealth earned can be used to pay the farmer, who then uses it for dresses made by the dressmaker, and so forth. A cooperative can help create more exportable products by helping musicians be video-taped as part of a digital creation that can be sold and marketed over the Internet. Whole communities can prosper even if only a few know how to use the technology as long as their is a local exchange in place to access and account for the digital wealth, then others in the community who do not use a computer can utilize (through trade) this wealth too.

One of our more innovative support projects called SCALE, charters a co-operative at the local level, a cooperative is an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations. Working closely with the Prosperity Program, all Access Points are provided a step-by-step plan for implementing a local private community Co-operative with a local currency that reflects the culture, needs, and national laws of the community.

PARTNERS: No one, two, or even ten organizations can challenge our planetary problems alone, a coordinated effort is required by all groups working everywhere, we all need a rallying point; therefore Peace Portal strives to connect complimentary projects with active organizations globally, volunteers, and supporting technologies through its Peace Partners communities.

[Peace Portal]

Portuguese Web site examines access to information in Brazil:

"London-based Article 19 has launched Marco do Acesso, a Portuguese-language Web site that provides information on Brazilian legal provisions on access to information. This user-friendly resource is open to journalists as well as civil society organizations and lawyers.

'Marco do Acesso' provides easy access to 20 thematic areas, including environment, health and education. According to Article 19, the Web site “seeks to empower users to take advantage of existing legal mechanisms to demand information from public bodies and to raise citizen awareness about their right to information.”

To access the site go to http://www.marco.artigo19.org/.