Gambia

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Country in a nutshell

The Gambia, officially the Republic of The Gambia, commonly known as just Gambia, is a country in Western Africa. It is the smallest country on the African continental mainland and is bordered to the north, east, and south by Senegal, and has a small coast on the Atlantic Ocean in the west. Flowing through the centre of the country and emptying into the Atlantic Ocean is the Gambia River.

In 1965, The Gambia became independent from the former British Empire and joined the Commonwealth of Nations.

Its population is 1.7 million.

Banjul is its capital but the largest conurbation is Serekunda.

Education in Country

Since 2002, a new basic education programme has been in place. Lower basic covers Grades 1 to 6 and upper basic covers Grades 7 to 9. Senior secondary education (Grades 10 to 12) is for pupils between the ages of 16 and 18. At the end of Grade 12, pupils sit for the West African Secondary School-leaving Certificate Examinations (WASSCE).

Further and Higher education

Higher education in The Gambia is provided by the University of The Gambia, created in 1999, which comprises four faculties and Gambia College which includes four schools: Agricultural Science, Education, Nursing and Midwifery, and Public Health.

See the infoDev Gambia report (2007) at http://www.infodev.org/en/Publication.405.html

This would form the basis of a good Country Report.

Information society

The proposed Gambia National Information and Communication Infrastructure (NICI) Policy and Plans was designed to address the areas where ICT would facilitate the achievement of the Vision 2020 overall objective, which is to transform the nation into a middle-income country by 2020 through accelerating private sector development, restructuring economic management, developing the human capital base, and institutionalising decentralised and democratic participatory government structures, processes, and systems. The overall objective for the policy is to “leapfrog” several stages of development by establishing a participatory approach in building human resources and a conducive environment that utilises ICT as a platform to exchange data, information, and knowledge, and as a tool to implement applications and provide services to achieve higher growth rates in all spheres of socio-economic activities.

The policy addresses 10 priority focus areas or pillars:

• Infrastructure
• Regulatory issues
• Local governance
• Education
• Health
• Trade and commerce
• E-governance
• Agriculture
• Gender
• Media

The Department of State for Communication, Information and Technology is the lead agency responsible for implementing the policy.

References

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