Sri Lanka’s e-society program that connects the unconnected rural and disadvantaged communities to the world of information and communication through new technologies drew plaudits at the recent Innovation Fair held at the World Bank in Washington, D.C., U.S.A. The Innovation Fair was organized to draw attention of the top Management of the World Bank to creative and fresh approaches in global development programs.

The e-Society program was one of six most distinctive projects from the South Asia region show cased at this inaugural World Bank Innovation fair. The program initiated and implemented under the e-Sri Lanka project by the Information Communication Technology (ICT) Agency stood out for its community driven use of ICT for Development (ICT4D). Encouraging local expertise, the e-society program showed how it has adroitly used ICT to develop programs that have helped rural farmers to access agricultural market information, provide social services and education opportunities to individuals and assist the disabled. In addition, the program demonstrated how new digital content products developed through e-society grants have harnessed local expertise to provide easier access to knowledge and learning for the vision and hearing impaired persons.