Building a digitally inclusive society for Hong Kong
25 - 08 - 2004

The Government has launched a series of initiatives to transform Hong Kong into a digitally inclusive society and enable all sectors of the community to benefit from the advancement of information and communications technology (ICT).

Speaking at the Seventh International Conference on Human Services Information Technology Applications today (August 25), the Deputy Government Chief Information Officer (Operation), Mr Stephen Mak Hung-sung, said the Government had spent more than $2.8 billion in the past five years on various initiatives to bridge the digital divide.

Mr Mak said that the digital inclusion programmes were part of the Digital 21 Strategy, with a wide range of initiatives aimed at elevating Hong Kong¡¦s overall ICT capabilities.

Government initiatives to complement digital inclusiveness include building the ICT infrastructure and security framework, fostering the development of the local ICT industry, promoting the wider adoption of ICT in business and education sectors, as well as sustaining the E-government programme.

One of the key digital inclusion programmes is the ¡§IT Hong Kong¡¨ Campaign (www.ithk.gov.hk) launched in 2000, which aims to promote the awareness and wider use of information technology (IT) in the community, as well as to educate the public on appropriate IT ethics.

Free IT awareness and training courses have been organised for 50,000 people from different sectors of the community, including the elderly, housewives, new immigrants and people with disabilities, providing them basic knowledge on computer usage and the Internet.

The 18 District Offices also actively participate in the campaign by organising IT-related activities, such as webpage design competitions, cyber points open day, IT carnivals and visits to IT exhibitions and facilities, to encourage the use of ICT in the community.

Although Hong Kong boasts a household personal computer penetration rate of 67.5%, some parts of the community may not be able to afford their own computers.

To further improve IT and Internet accessibility, the Government has installed about 5,300 personal computers with Internet connection at community halls, district cyber centres, post offices and social service centres across the territory for free use by the public.

Assistive devices, such as Braille display, screen enlargement and voice synthesising software, touch screen and trackball, have been installed to cater for the distinctive needs of special groups such as the elderly and people with disabilities.

Besides providing funds for the disabled to acquire computers at home, the Government also supports computer recycling and donation. About 1,000 used personal computers were donated to voluntary organisations and sponsorship was also provided for non-government organisations to recycle 400 computers for the under-privileged groups.

Mr Mak said the Government was concerned about the frustration faced by certain disadvantaged groups who were unable to use the web effectively due to various constraints. For example, vision-impaired people may have difficulties in ¡§seeing¡¨ graphics and images while people with hearing problems may miss out content of an audio clip.

To ensure online public services are accessible to all, the Government revamped all its websites to comply with internationally recognised web accessibility guidelines by 2002.

Moreover, government websites maintain a consistent design by following a set of internal ¡§common look and feel¡¨ guidelines to make navigation easy. Simplified Chinese versions of webpages are also provided in addition to English and Traditional Chinese.

To enhance access of web information by the elderly and vision impaired users, a pilot Sound Portal (www.soundportal.gov.hk) was launched this year. Employing the latest text-to-speech technology, the portal ¡§reads¡¨ out the content of the websites in Cantonese, Putonghua or English.

The Government also collaborates with professional bodies to conduct seminars to promote web accessibility and encourage the adoption of barrier-free web design in the private sector.

A theme page on web accessibility (http://www.info.gov.hk/digital21/eng/knowledge/webacc.html) was also set up on the Digital 21 website while a computer-based self-learning CD-ROM was freely distributed to provide tips on web design.

Among the new initiatives, a Digital Solidarity Fund was recently set up jointly with the social service sector and the industry to provide funding for non-government organisations to organise activities on bridging the digital divide. A committee has also been set up to consider applications.

"We shall keep abreast of international developments and technological innovation in enhancing our programmes. We will continue to work with the industry, academia and the community to drive web accessibility forward and turn Hong Kong into a digitally inclusive society," Mr Mak said.

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