International conference Media and Information Literacy for Building Culture of Open Government held in Khanty-Mansiysk under the aegis of UNESCO 

17.06.2016

 

On 7–10 June 2016 Khanty-Mansiysk successfully hosted the International conference Media and Information Literacy for Building Culture of Open Government. The first-ever global meeting on the topic was hold within the framework of the UNESCO Information for All Programme and the Eighth International IT Forum.

 

The conference attracted attention of both major international experts and public authorities of many countries. More than half of 110 participants were nominated by their respective governments.

 

The conference gathered leading scientists, academia, politicians, diplomatic officials, government, civil society and private sector representatives from almost 50 countries – Albania, Andorra, Argentina, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Benin, Brazil, China, Colombia, Czech Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Finland, France, Haiti, Honduras, Hungary, India, Iran, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lebanon, Macedonia, Mexico, Moldova, Morocco, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway, Palau, Palestine, Paraguay, Peru, the Philippines, Romania, Russia, Senegal, South Africa, Thailand, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Vietnam, Zimbabwe.

 

The conference’s high topicality was based on the need to solve two major problems of our time.

 

The first task is to boost and maintain an appropriate level of information and media competences of citizens in order to help people to live, develop and act efficiently in a rapidly and radically changing information environment witnessing an explosion of technology. The importance of this issue is now recognized the world over, and media and information literacy building is gaining momentum in all countries.

 

The need for the fullest possible civic engagement and for creating effective feedback mechanisms is also recognized everywhere and at international, national, regional and municipal levels. This goal can be achieved by building open government systems in cyberspace. This is the second important task.

 

The Conference four key goals included:

·       developing and advancing UNESCO’s international policy in the field of media and information literacy promotion with regard to the problem of building open governments;

·       defining conceptual framework of creating an open government culture;

·       identifying and retranslating international experience of open governments functioning;

·       enabling the adaptation of media and information literacy curricula/education programmes to the tasks of building open governments.

 

The conference heralded a new important shift towards using media and information literacy to solve the problems of building open governments and establishing feedback mechanisms between governments and the society.

 

While media and information literacy has long been among UNESCO's priorities, the topic of open governance is quite new for UNESCO. UNESCO Intergovernmental Information for All Programme has always tried to look ahead, and this conference is another future outlook.

 

Conference participants reviewed the issues of media and information literacy in the context of building sustainable open governments following the conceptual provisions of the Moscow Declaration on Media and Information Literacy for Knowledge Societies (2012) and UNESCO-IFLA Media and Information Literacy Recommendations (2013).

 

The conference was organized by:

• Government of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Area – Ugra,
• Commission of the Russian Federation for UNESCO,
• UNESCO /  UNESCO Information for All Programme (IFAP),
• Russian Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications,
• Russian IFAP Committee,
• Interregional Library Cooperation Centre.

 

Financial support was provided by the Ugra Government, the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications, UNESCO and LUKOIL Company.

 

Greetings to the conference organizers and participants were received from:

• Governor of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Area – Ugra Natalia Komarova,
• Russia’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Gennady Gatilov,
• UNESCO Assistant Director-General Frank La Rue,
• IFAP Intergovernmental Council Chair Chafica Haddad.

 

Conference Organizing Committee co-chairs – Deputy Governor of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Area – Ugra Alexey Zabozlayev and Chairman of the Russian UNESCO IFAP Committee, President of the Interregional Library Cooperation Centre Evgeny Kuzmin greeted the participants at the opening ceremony.

 

The conference was attended by Ugra Governor Natalia Komarova, Director of the Russian Government Department for the Formation of Open Government Makar German, Deputy Chief of Staff to the Moscow Mayor and Moscow Government Evgeny Kozlov, Head of IT Department – Minister of the Moscow Government Artem Ermolayev, South Africa’s Minister of Communications Faith Muthambi.

 

“Here, in Ugra, we have been working on the issues on the conference agenda for several years, – said Ugra Governor Natalia Komarova in her speech. The task of Open Government is to place the population on the agenda, to see people’s needs and respond to them. It requires interactive services, crowd sourcing and dialogue platforms, developing open data systems, media and information literacy training, strengthening the role of public and expert councils. All these help the citizens to formulate their needs, questions and tasks for the authorities more clearly. We consider these complementary elements as a complex, living Open region ecosystem. We are working on a new chapter to the Ugra Development Strategy for the period until 2030, dedicated to the development of civil society in Ugra. Fostering media and information literacy will become a part of this strategy.”

 

In order to implement the Strategy an “Open Region” Centre was created in Ugra at the end of 2015 – a kind of a resource centre for building a culture of openness in public administration. In recent years over 85,000 people of Ugra have completed training within the e-Citizen Programme and got necessary skills to use the public services portal. Similar training on ensuring public integrity, anti-corruption expertise, participation in public acceptance of construction and repair services is provided for non-profit organizations and public councils under government bodies and local authorities.

 

A total of 42 reports were presented at the conference. The list of speakers included:

 

Evgeny KUZMIN, Vice-Chair, Intergovernmental Council for the UNESCO Information for All Programme; Chair, Russian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme; President, Interregional Library Cooperation Centre (Moscow, Russia)

Media and Information Literacy and Open Government: How Can They Improve Our Lives?

 

Elena SHUMAKOVA, Director, Department for Public and External Relations of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Area – Ugra (Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia)

Open Region Project: Building a Culture of Openness in Public Administration and New Opportunities for Citizens

 

Alfredo RONCHI, Secretary, MEDICI European Commission Framework of Cooperation; Professor, Milan Polytechnic University (Milan, Italy)

Sewing the Snatch: “a” Citizens, Government and Open Government

 

László KARVALICS, Professor, University of Szeged; Chairman, Hungarian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme (Szeged, Hungary)

Open Government: Information History Considerations and Contexts

 

Galit WELLNER, Faculty Member, The NB School of Design (Tel Aviv, Israel)

Media Literacy and Innovation: From Open Governance to Well-Being

 

Maria Carme TORRAS CALVO, Library Director, University of Bergen; IFLA Governing Board Member (Bergen, Norway)

Access to Knowledge for Open Government: The Contribution of IFLA and Libraries

 

Tapio VARIS, Professor, University of Tampere (Tampere, Finland)

Civilizations, Technology and Literacies

 

Natalia GENDINA, Director, Institute of ICTs for Social Sphere; Professor, Kemerovo State Institute of Culture and the Arts (Kemerovo, Russia)

Media and Information Literacy and Information Culture as an Imperative for Development of Open Government and e-Citizenship

 

Ramon TUAZON, President, Asian Institute of Journalism and Communication

(Manila, Philippines)

Core Competencies of Public (Government) Information Officers in the 21^st Century

 

Maryam NAZARI, Consultant, Iranian Research Institute for Information Science and Technology (IranDoc) (Tehran, Iran)

Understanding Information Literacy Requirements Needed for the Successful Implementation of Open Governance: Proposal of a Contextual-Participatory Approach

 

Svetlana KNYAZEVA, Head of Division, UNESCO Institute of Information Technologies for Education

ICT for Education: A Holistic Approach to Media and Information Literacy

 

Arpad RAB, Senior Researcher, Obuda University; Moderator, UNESCO Information Society Observatory Portal (Ocsa, Hungary)

Digital Culture, e-Democracy and Open Government

 

Abbas SIBAI, Cofounder & President, Live Love Lebanon Foundation (Beirut, Lebanon)

Online Citizen Engagement for Local Development: Free Online Tools to Close the Policy Feedback Loop

 

Alexander SHARIKOV, Professor, National State University – Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia)

Media and Information Literacy as an Important Element of Civic Education

 

Mohamed EL GUINDY, TV Presenter, Al Kahera Wal Nas TV Channel; Cyber Expert, Technologist and Researcher (Cairo, Egypt)

Middle East Media and Information Literacy in the Digital Age

 

Irina ZHILAVSKAYA, Head of Chair, UNESCO Chair on Media and Information Literacy and Media Education of Citizens at Moscow Pedagogical State University (Moscow, Russia)

Media and Information Literacy as a Factor of Improving Efficiency of Open Government

 

Lune Roc PIERRE LOUIS, Professor & Researcher, State University of Haiti (Port-au-Prince, Haiti)

Media and Information Literacy for Building Citizenship in Haiti

 

Evgeny KOZLOV, Deputy Chief of Staff to the Moscow Mayor and Moscow Government

Engaging Citizens in Management: Moscow Experience

 

Susana FINQUELIEVICH, Professor, University of Buenos Aires; Principal Researcher, National Council of Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET) (Buenos Aires, Argentina)

Driving a Culture of Open Government in Latin America

 

Ricardo PERLINGEIRO, Law Professor, Fluminense Federal University Law School; Federal Judge, Federal Regional Court of the 2^nd Region (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil)

Euphoria and Concerns about the Tendencies in the Right to Official Information in Latin America

 

Hector Ivan HURTATIS ESPINOSA, Assistant Researcher on the Research Line of Public Policy Issues, Faculty of Political Science and Government, Universidad del Rosario (Colombia)

Policy Analysis and Evaluation of Colombian Open Government Initiatives: Case Study of Government Online (Gobierno en Linea)

 

Catalin VRABIE, Lecturer, National University of Political Studies and Public Administration (Bucharest, Romania)

Building Culture of Open Government. What’s Still Lacking to Eastern European Countries?

 

Ainars KOMAROVSKIS, Chair of the Board, NGO “Dinamunde” for Protection of Cultural Heritage (Riga, Latvia)

Information Environment in Latvia: Opportunities and Limitations

 

Louis POUZIN, Chief Executive Officer, Open-Root Company (Paris, France)

A Brief History of Networks. Condensed History of Computer Networking, from Early 50s through Nowadays

 

Alexander ZYKOV, Director, Ugra Research Institute of Information Technologies (Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia)

Building Culture of Open Government in Certain Social Groups of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Area – Ugra

 

Ludmila BARBA, TV Projects Coordinator, Moldova-1 TV Channel, Teleradio-Moldova Public Broadcasting Company (Chisinau, Republic of Moldova)

Open Information Society: The Right to Quality Information, Responsibilities and Safety

 

Evgeny Torgashin, Researcher, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (Moscow, Russia)

Human Capital and Open Government

 

Plenary sessions were moderated by Evgeny Kuzmin, Elena Shumakova, Tatiana Ershova, Tatiana Murovana, Alexander Sharikov (Russia), Alfredo Ronchi (Italy), Galit Wellner (Israel), László Karvalics (Hungary), Piotr Lapo (Kazakhstan), Susana Finquelievich (Argentine), Maria Carme Torras Calvo (Norway), Adolf Knoll (Czech Republic).

 

Participants to the conference Media and Information Literacy for Building Culture of Open Government Evgeny Kuzmin and Louis Pouzin (France) spoke at the opening ceremony of the Eighth International IT Forum and at its closing plenary meeting.

 

All conference participants received information and analytical materials on media and information literacy and other information society issues, published in Russian and English by the Russian IFAP Committee and the Interregional Library Cooperation Centre since 2002. These publications formed the basis of a book exhibition opened at the conference.

 

The Russian IFAP Committee timed the release of its new English-language publication to the conference opening – the Proceedings of the Ugra Global Expert Meeting on Multilingualism in Cyberspace (Khanty-Mansiysk, 4-9 July 2015).

 

At the conference closing all participants noted the high organizational level of this content rich event and expressed gratitude to its organizers.

 

Cultural and introductory programme of the conference included visiting the Ob-Ugric Institute of Applied Research and Development, the Ugra Research Institute of Information Technologies, the Torum Maa Outdoor Ethnographic Museum, the Museum of Nature and Man, as well as watching a performance by the “Sun” Theatre of Ob-Ugric peoples.

 

An impressive list of participants to the conference and the feedback received from them indicated the world’s growing interest to the problems raised within the framework of the UNESCO Information for All Programme, and to the initiatives of Ugra and the whole Russia in the field of communication and information.

 

The Khanty-Mansiysk conference has become a central event of the Eighth International IT-Forum and also Russia’s new contribution to the implementation of the Information for All Programme – UNESCO’s major intergovernmental programme in the field of communication and information and the only intergovernmental programme in the world to imply a comprehensive and holistic approach to humanitarian issues crucial for the future of the information society – information accessibility, information preservation, media and information literacy, information ethics, information for development, preservation of languages and their development in cyberspace.

 

In his welcome address to the participants and organizers of the Eighth IT Forum Sergey Lavrov, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Chairman of the Commission of the Russian Federation for UNESCO, particularly noted the International Conference Media and Information Literacy for Building Culture of Open Government among other events of the Forum.

 

An international working group was formed to accomplish the elaboration of the Conference Final Document, including Maria Carme Torras Calvo (Norway), Alfredo Ronchi (Italy), Maryam Nazari (Iran), Albert Boekhorst (Netherlands), Saleh Masharqa (Palestine), Evgeny Kuzmin and Tatiana Murovana (Russia).

 

 

The Final Document, participants’ reports will appear at the Russian IFAP Committee’s website later.

 

 

 

Natalya Komarova, Governor of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug – Ugra at the VIII International IT Forum opening ceremony

 

The VIII International IT Forum opening ceremony

 

Nikolay Nikiforov, Minister of Telecom and Mass Communications of the Russian Federation at the VIII International IT Forum opening ceremony

 

Participants of the the International conference Media and Information Literacy for Building Culture of Open Government

 

Opening ceremony of the conference

 

Opening ceremony of the conference

 

Hara Prasad Padhy, Programme Specialist, Communication and Information Sector

 

Nikolay Khaustov, First Secretary of the Commission of the Russian Federation for UNESCO, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation

 

Evgeny Kuzmin, UNESCO Vice-Chair, Intergovernmental Council for the UNESCO Information for All Programme; Chairman, Russian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme; President, Interregional Library Cooperation Centre

 

 

Alfredo Ronchi, Secretary, MEDICI European Commission Framework of Cooperation; Professor, MilanPolytechnic University (Milan, Italy)

 

 

Tatiana Murovana, Executive Secretary, Russian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme, Maria Carme Torras Calvo, Library Director, University of Bergen; IFLA Governing Board Member (Bergen, Norway)

  

László Karvalics, Professor, University of Szeged; Chairman, Hungarian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme (Szeged, Hungary)

 

Chantal Lebrument, President, EUROLINC Association  (Paris, France), Louis Pouzin, Chief Executive Officer, Open-Root Company (Paris, France), Tapio Varis, Professor, University of Tampere (Tampere, Finland)

 

Maria Carme Torras Calvo, Library Director, University of Bergen; IFLA Governing Board Member (Bergen, Norway)

 

Faith Muthambi, Minister of Communications, Republic of South Africa

 

Natalya Komarova, Governor of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug – Ugra, Alexander Sharikov Professor, National Research University – Higher School of Economics

 

Natalia Gendina, Director, Institute of ICTs for Social Sphere; Professor, Kemerovo State Institute of Culture and the Arts (Kemerovo, Russia)

 

Ludmila Barba, TV Projects Coordinator, Moldova-1 TV Channel, Teleradio-Moldova Public Broadcasting Company (Chisinau, Republic of Moldova), Ramon Tuazon, President, Asian Institute of Journalism and Communication (Manila, Philippines)

 

Alejandro Funes Lastra, Counsellor, Permanent Delegation of Argentina to UNESCO, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Argentina, Susana Finquelievich, Professor, University of Buenos Aires; Principal Researcher, National Council of Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET) (Buenos Aires, Argentina)

 

Habib Abba Jato, Director, Chief Executive Officer, National Library of Nigeria, Albert Boekhorst, Research Fellow, University of Pretoria, South Africa

 

Artyom Ermolayev, Minister, Moscow Government, Head, Department of Information Technology 

 

Galit Wellner, Faculty Member, The NB School of Design (Tel Aviv, Israel), Saleh Badawi Mashsrqa, Research and Policy Trainer, Birziet University (Ramallah, Palestine)

 

Marina Oliveira, International Trainee, Russian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme; Student Researcher, International Relations Department, Pontifical Catholic University of Minas Gerais (Belo Horizonte, Brazil), Alexander Sharikov, Professor, National Research University –Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia), Maryam Nazari, Consultant, Iranian Research Institute for Information Science and Technology (IranDoc) (Tehran, Iran), Evgeny Kuzmin, UNESCO Vice-Chair, Intergovernmental Council for the UNESCO Information for All Programme; Chairman, Russian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme; President, Interregional Library Cooperation Centre,Natalya Komarova, Governor of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug – Ugra, Maria Carme Torras Calvo, Library Director, University of Bergen; IFLA Governing Board Member (Bergen, Norway)

 

Adolf Knoll, Secretary for Science, Research and International Cooperation, National Library of the Czech Republic

 

Svetlana Knyazeva, Head of Division, UNESCO Institute of Information Technologies for Education

  

Maryam Nazari, Consultant, Iranian Research Institute for Information Science and Technology (IranDoc) (Tehran, Iran)

 

Baktiiar Aliev, Director, Republican Radio and Television Centre, Public Broadcasting Corporation of the Kyrgyz Republic, Piotr Lapo, General Library Expert, Nazarbaev University (Astana, Kazakhstan)

 

Arpad Rab, Senior Researcher, Obuda University; Moderator, UNESCO Information Society Observatory Portal (Ocsa, Hungary) Susana Finquelievich, Professor, University of Buenos Aires; Principal Researcher, National Council of Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET) (Buenos Aires, Argentina), Piotr Lapo, General Library Expert, Nazarbaev University (Astana, Kazakhstan)

 

Abbas Sibai, Cofounder & President, Live Love Lebanon Foundation (Beirut, Lebanon)

 

Sergey Davydov, Deputy Dean, Faculty of Communication, Media and Design, National Research University – Higher School of Economics, Alexander Sharikov, Professor, National Research University –Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia)

 

Lune Roc Pierre Louis, Professor & Researcher, State University of Haiti (Port-au-Prince, Haiti), Mohamed El Guindy, TV Presenter, Al Kahera Wal Nas TV Channel; Cyber Expert, Technologist and Researcher (Cairo, Egypt)

 

Susana Finquelievich, Professor, University of Buenos Aires; Principal Researcher, National Council of Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET) (Buenos Aires, Argentina)

 

 

Makar German, Director, Open Government Department, Government of the Russian Federation

 

Joan-Carles Rodriguez Miñana, Member, Andorra National Commission for UNESCO, Remzi Lani, Executive Director, Albanian Media Institute

 

Brahim Gherras, Chief of Cinema and Copyright Service, Ministry of Communication of Morocco

 

Tatiana Ershova, General Director, Institute of the Information Society (Moscow, Russia)

 

Evgeny Kozlov, Deputy Chief of Staff to the Moscow Mayor and Moscow Government, Catalin Vrabie, Lecturer, National University of Political Studies and Public Administration (Bucharest, Romania)

 

Dennis Kuko Chebitwey, Director of Public Communications, Ministry of Information, Communication and Technology 

 

Ricardo Perlingeriro, Law Professor, Fluminense Federal University Law School; Federal Judge, Federal Regional Court of the 2^nd Region (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil)

 

Louis Pouzin, Chief Executive Officer, Open-Root Company (Paris, France)

  

Hector Ivan Hurtatis Espinosa, Assistant Researcher on the Research Line of Public Policy Issues, Faculty of Political Science and Government, Universidad del Rosario (Colombia)

 

José Antonio Funes Rodriguez, Minister Counsellor for Communication and Information, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Honduras

 

Catalin Vrabie, Lecturer, National University of Political Studies and Public Administration (Bucharest, Romania)

 

Carmelo Gabriel Borrego Rosales, Second Secretary, Permanent Delegation of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela to UNESCO

 

Oksana Makeyeva, Director, Open Region Centre (Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia), Irina Beznosova, Deputy Head of Department – Head of Division for Coordination of Foreign Relations, Department for Public and External Relations of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug – Ugra

 

Ainars Komarovskis, Chair of the Board, NGO “Dinamunde” for Protection of Cultural Heritage (Riga, Latvia)

 

Ramon Tuazon, President, Asian Institute of Journalism and Communication (Manila, Philippines), Maria Leticia Casati Caballero, Chargé d’affaires a.i., Permanent Delegation of Paraguay to UNESCOМ, Saleh Badawi Mashsrqa, Research and Policy Trainer, Birziet University (Ramallah, Palestine), Maria Carme Torras Calvo, Library Director, University of Bergen; IFLA Governing Board Member (Bergen, Norway)

 

Thu Hang Mai, Head of Information Section, International Cooperation Department, Ministry of Information and Communication of Vietnam (Hanoi, Vietnam)

 

Zemfira Meybalieva, Deputy Chief, Department for Social Issues, Cabinet of Ministers of the Azerbaijan Republic, Karine Manukyan, Senior Specialist, Public Relations and Information Department, Ministry of Education and Science of Armenia

 

Regis Chikowore, Principal Director, Ministry of Information, Media and Broadcasting Services of Zimbabwe

 

Alexander Zykov, Director, Ugra Research Institute of Information Technologies (Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia)

 

 

 

 

Tatiana Ershova, General Director, Institute of the Information Society (Moscow, Russia), Aleksandra Konakova, Executive Secretary, Modern Library Publishing Consulting Centre (Moscow, Russia)

Carmelo Gabriel Borrego Rosales, Second Secretary, Permanent Delegation of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela to UNESCO, Porntip Yenjabok, Assistant Professor, Department of Communication, Arts and Information Science, Faculty of Humanities, Kasetsart University (Bangkok, Thailand), Sudteewan Suksai, Student Researcher, Department of Communication Arts and Information Science, Kasetsart University (Bangkok, Thailand)

Evgeny Torgashin, Researcher, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (Moscow, Russia)

 

International Trainee, Russian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme Marina Oliveira ( Belo Horizonte , Brazil) is giving an interview to a regional TV

Tatyana Murovana and Evgeny Kuzmin

 

Walk through the city

 

Visit to Ugra Research Institute of Information Technologies

 

 

Visit to Ugra Research Institute of Information Technologies

 

Alejandro Funes Lastra, Counsellor, Permanent Delegation of Argentina to UNESCO, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Argentina, Fabio Mendes Marzano, Minister-Counsellor, Ministry of External Relations of Brazil; Deputy Permanent Delegate, Permanent Delegation of Brazil to UNESCO

 

Visit to Torum Maa Outdoor Ethnografic Museum

 

Maria Leticia Casati Caballero

Visit to Torum Maa Outdoor Ethnografic Museum

 

Saleh Badawi Masharqa at the Torum Maa Outdoor Ethnografic Museum

 

Visit to Museum of Nature and Man

 

 

Organizing committee of the conference

 

Participants of the conference

 

 

Sergey Bakeykin, Executive Director, Interregional Library Cooperation Centre; Deputy Chair, Russian Committee for the UNESCO Information for All Programme; Vice-President, Russian Library Association (Moscow, Russia)