EGranary Digital Library: Bridging the Digital Divide in Zambia

This presentation will focus upon the issues of social justice, the digital divide, and the challenge of Internet and information access in developing countries. While the Internet is rich in freely available educational content, it is often not so “freely” accessible by those who can benefit greatly from it, particularly health sciences students, faculty, and practitioners in developing countries. Information and communication technologies can encourage capacity building efforts of health professionals through overcoming outdated or limited educational materials. However, key challenges inhibiting equitable health information access, including inadequate Internet infrastructure, high cost of access, and limited information and computer literacy, persist in many developing countries. When planning educational interventions and capacity building projects, health and information professionals should consider these barriers and alternatives to overcome this disparity. As a case example, we will explore the use of an alternative method of providing digital content, entitled the eGranary Digital Library, currently installed in several Zambian health sciences teaching facilities. The eGranary provides up to 2 TB of educational information, ranging from audio to video to websites and software across a user's Local Area Network (LAN), interfacing like the Internet but without the need for bandwidth.