"East-West" Women’s Innovation Fund
Practical Assistance to Women’s
Associations Through Organized Information Support Service
Interregional Conference December 15-16, 1997
The Conference was attended by over 40
representatives of women’s non-government organizations from many Russian
territories, including Moscow, Moscow region, St. Petersburg, Murmansk,
Petrozavodsk, Surgut, Nizhny Novgorod, Kirov, Ivanovo (see List of Organizations).
Participants’ scope of interests and activities varied widely, ranging
from social support to destitute social groups to women’s pub-lic position
advance at highest levels of decision making. The Conference goal was to
outline opportunities for more effective use of information resources developed
by "East-West" Women’s Innovation Fund and other organizations
(see Conference Agenda).
On the first day of the Conference, "East-West" Women’s Innovation
Fund (WIF) presented its information programs, including demonstration
of OWL web-site user resources. The second day included presentations by
information resources providers: Social Information Agency; Independent
Women’s Forum Information Center; Women’s Information Network; "East-West"
Women’s Network; USA-CIS Women’s Non-government Organizations Consortium;
St. Petersburg Center of Gender Prob-lems; and others. At workgroups, participants
discussed proposals on how informa-tion services and resources available
through WIF could be adapted to manage in-formation flows relevant to subjects
of interest to particular groups.
While preparing for the Conference, "East-West" Women’s Innovation
Fund had conducted a mini-study of Cross-organizational Networking in Information
Space. At the Conference itself, the following topics were discussed: what
data are most relevant to women’s associations’ activities at present;
what are their requirements for infor-mation; what are (and what should
be) prevailing channels of information exchange. Mini-workshops came to
the following conclusions. Basic requirements to information are its comprehensiveness,
relevance, and timeliness. Most problems are associated with ineffective
communication of information due to women’s organizations’ under-equipment
with modern telecommunication means and their ignorance of modern communication
technologies and information systems. For this reason, many organi-zations
do not avail of Internet and even e-mail as communication channels, limiting
themselves to telephone, facsimile and "snail-male". Therefore,
most valuable qualities of information (e. g., comprehensiveness, timeliness
and relevance) are impaired. Educational efforts are required to shape
cognizance of and interest in new information systems, along with training
programs to help develop user skills for new telecommunication technologies.
The Conference decided: "East-West" Women’s Innovation Fund
will provide regular consultations about access to and use of Internet
resources. Weekly consultations for members of women’s NGOs will take place
every Thursday. Detailed information and enrollment contact: 952 2572 (Moscow).
The Conference also outlined profile of women’s NGOs demand for information.
Therefore, WIF has decided to widen the scope of information available
at its OWL web-site (http://195.128.92.114) through incorporating the
following features:
Treasury Island information system — complete and regularly updated
da-tabase of Russian-based funds supporting women’s initiatives and movements
Pin-up Board — any relevant ads published and renewed monthly
a page informing about ongoing training programs: organizers, subjects,
locations, terms
a page with summaries of recent studies and surveys and current
meas-urements of women-related descriptors and indicators
We welcome everyone who would like to place some information at "OWL"
site!
You can send us information about your training and research projects
or simple ad-vertisements, announcements and messages. Please, forward
your information via e-mail to the address: femrus@online.ru
Small messages (no more than 25 words) may also be faxed to: (095) 952
2572. Your information will be placed on one of our pages in Internet.
You are welcome!!!
PS. At the Conference the following materials were suggested to be
regularly published by "OWL":
"Posidelky" ("Companions") bulletin issued by
St. Petersburg Center of Gender Problems
"O nas in nashem dele" ("We and our Cause")
published by Women’s Information Network.
"East-West" Women’s Innovation Fund awaits these materials
soon. You can return to the OWL page in the Web December 25, 1997
