Dear Colleagues,

If you have ever wondered where you can find an overview of the many web portals
and sites that exist on a particular development topic, then you should visit
the Development Gateway www.developmentgateway.org.

This has been under development for the past 10 months with funding from
the World Bank, and support from many hundreds of governmental and
non-governmental organisations and large numbers of individual
professionals, academics.  It is now fully functional in every respect
though the official "launch" is still some weeks away.

An important, and growing area, of the Gateway is the main "topic" of
Culture and Development, with substantial sub-topics of Arts, Media and
Crafts, Cultural Management (including cultural economics and and
training), Cultural Policy, Cultural Tourism, and Heritage Preservation.
These cover all areas of culture, including the arts, media, traditional
and contemporary crafts, museums, galleries, historic buildings and sites,
and the intangible cultural heritage.

We already have several selected hundred sources of information
including case studies, projects, official policies and reports.  Unlike
a basic web site listing, directory or bibliography every entry is
supported by an abstract which summarises the contents and significance
of the document or web site presented.

The Development Gateway is a knowledge sharing initiative about development that
is taking shape in collaboration with the private sector, civil society,
international agencies, and governments.  It consists of a global portal where
people and organisations can share knowledge, engage in dialogues, and work
together to reduce poverty.  The gateway platform is also being used to launch
country gateways so that people and organisations in developing countries are
connected.  As well as Culture and Development, the topics covered include
such areas as health, education, E-government, disaster management, food
security, gender issues, etc.

The Gateway also features unique databases such as the Accessible Information on
Development Activity (AIDA) where you can find out  what development projects
the World Bank and other aid agencies are planning in a particular country or
region.  The AIDA databases contains information on projects completed, being
planned, and underway from over 200 funding agencies.  Soon the Gateway will
also offer E-procurement and an E-book store.

Anyone with web access can browse all parts of the Gateway free of charge.

However, we are very keen to see this being developed and added to by as
many professionals, academics and other experts or specialists in any of
the topics covered.  We are looking to the whole of the community to
contribute both web links and original reports and publications, as well
as information and discussion. To become an active supporter and start
contributing, to ask or answer a question posted on a topic page, or add
comments to a discussion, all that is needed is a one-off on-line
registration.

This is easy and quick: just go to http://www.developmentgateway.org and
click on either "Join the Gateway"  or "My Gateway",

I do hope that you will check out the Development Gateway, and especially
the Culture and Development area of it, let us have your views and
feedback, and then become active users and contributors.


Many thanks.


Patrick Boylan
Guide (Site Manager) for Culture and Development

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