Red or Blue? The Importance of Digital Literacy in African Rural Communities

In many Southern African cultures, the colours red and blue symbolise tradition and modernity respectively. In this paper we describe our experience within an ICT-for-development project in Dwesa, a “Blue” rural community on the Wild Coast of South Africa. In particular, we focus on the contribution of digital literacy and Internet connectivity in the area in mitigating the negative effects of an outbreak of swine fever in the area, which had devastating effect on the economy and eco-system in the area. We compare Dwesa with a neighbouring, more “Red” community in an attempt to show the direct link between access to ICT and poverty alleviation. We view this research as a case to support the teaching of digital literacy even in communities which are already marginalised in so many other ways.