New Perspectives In Digitial Literacy Readiness

Abstract The evolution of Information and Communication Technologies ICT has generated associated terms such as e-readiness e-government digital literacy and digital divide. These terms are inter-related in one way or the other. Numerous services have also been created for the sake of convenience and easy access to information submission and retrieval. Digital literacy has now become an integral part of our lives and it is deeply embedded in our daily lifestyle. By the end of 2013 it was expected that broadband subscriptions would rise beyond 2 billion globally. The governments and corporates have demonstrated greater interest in taking advantage of this unique and state of the art technology to tap the potential both politically and economically. The governments are busy formulating strategies and policies and heavily investing in building ICT infrastructures in order to electronically reach out to the citizens to the last mile for better and effective governance. This will also fulfill its objective to address socio- economic issues such as education governance citizenship participation employment health food security amongst others. The corporates on the other hand are concentrating on formulating sales and marketing strategies to achieve competitive advantage by offering their products and services to the last mile. ICT has opened up windows of opportunities for almost every sector. Efforts are on to bridge the digital and technological divide within and between countries. In this paper a brief focus is on the digital literacy levels in developed developing and least developed nations.