Last June, the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, then known as the Office of Ethnic Communities, disbursed a $200,000 Digital Inclusion Fund to 12 communities across New Zealand to bridge the digital divide, the gap between those who benefit from modern ICT and those who do not.
The fund aims to ensure African, Asian, Continental European, Latin-American and Middle Eastern-identifying peoples can fully participate in Aotearoa New Zealand’s society by increasing their confidence using digital technologies.
A ministry spokesperson said that during the Covid lockdowns, “it became more obvious that ethnic communities faced challenges accessing, using, and benefiting from digital technology and the Internet”.
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The fund’s priorities were to ensure that ethnic communities had skills to use digital technology in beneficial ways, were motivated to understand the benefits that digital technology could provide, could trust in online services and had confidence to manage personal information while understanding and avoiding scams, harmful content and misleading information.
Stuff spoke to several recipients about how they intended to use the funding.
Chris McKeen
NZ Muslim Association chairman Ikhlaq Kashkari says the association is working to improve the digital technology skills among the Muslim seniors’ community.
The New Zealand Muslim Association (NZMA) said it was focusing on digital inclusion for senior citizens. NZMA chairman Ikhlaq Kashkari said the need for those skills in the Muslim seniors’ community surfaced during lockdowns when “elderly community members were [unable] to connect with their whānau and use technology [safely]”.
They will be taught how to set up Zoom and WhatsApp to stay connected during lockdown, as well as online banking, social media and cybersecurity skills. There will be about 20 sessions held across Auckland including women-only sessions.
The Refugee Orientation Centre (ROC) Trust said it was working towards helping refugees become self-sufficient and has planned digital literacy workshops for former refugees and new migrants in Hamilton.
ROC has organised 14 programmes, including driving lessons and study skills for children, but the demand for IT skills has been high. Its digital literacy programme is set to begin in February and aims to prepare refugees and new migrants for work through two 15-week block courses.
Programme development manager Raj Kanthasamy said the project’s objectives were to improve people’s confidence using online services such as MyIR, RealMe and Trade Me, set up Wi-fi, communicate digitally through online chat, improve social connection through social media, and support people to create digital content such as flyers and invites.
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Delta’s arrival meant the programme was unable to commence as planned in 2021 due to lockdowns and the double-vaccination requirement to attend the course. Kanthasamy attempted to conduct Zoom sessions during lockdown, but participants were reluctant to attend because they did not have the right devices or were not confident with using the technology.
Research available from the digital.govt.nz website on the digital inclusion of former refugees and migrants with English as a second language showed that access and skills were the two main barriers to inclusion, among lower English-language proficiency, cultural barriers and low socio-economic status.
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Positive feedback from an intergenerational digital workshop held by the Korean Positive Ageing Charitable Trust in 2020 inspires more workshops this year. (Image description: Two senior Korean women are looking at a young Korean man demonstrating how to use a smartphone. They are huddled around a table in a room with other workshop attendants.)
The site also revealed that at least 24.19 per cent of retired New Zealanders don’t have access to the internet. To address this issue, the Korean Positive Ageing Charitable Trust has been holding mobile phone workshops for Korean seniors.
In the past, these were taught by Korean high school and university students in small groups. Because of the positive feedback, Yongrahn Park, the trust’s founder, has planned one-to-one mobile phone workshops and computer classes this year.
Workshop attendees can learn everyday skills like sending photos to their family in Korea on KakaoTalk, a mobile messaging app that is popular in South Korea.
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Digital safety was one of the skills taught within the Muskaan Care Trust programme. (Image description: A group of 14 ethnically diverse people involved in the Muskaan Care Trust programme are smiling at the camera with the police officer guest speaker).
Meanwhile, the Muskaan Care Trust, the recipient with the largest share of the grant, has organised digital coaching programmes to inspire wellness. The group’s focus was on assisting anyone in distress or with a disability so that “no one is left behind”. The ethnically diverse team has connected with Indian, South Asian, Chinese, Korean and African groups, and they hope to continue extending these partnerships.
The trust’s organisers, Vivek Vij and Nivedita Sharma, said that past workshops had taught people how to do online banking, make vaccination bookings, request vaccination passes, find authentic information and avoid scams, and connect with their Green Prescription activities such as yoga and BollyX workouts.
One-on-one person-centric digital coaching sessions were being planned with setting up an email account, password safety and management, online shopping and paying bills proving popular. “Somebody even wanted to learn how to use Bitcoin,” Sharma said.
Martin Meissner/AP
Seniors are learning to use various media platforms to reduce reliance on their relatives.
Sharma added that “lots of seniors enjoy using various media platforms like WhatsApp, WeChat, Instagram and Facebook”.
“We see lots of happy faces beaming with new acquired confidence in the digital world,” she said. A few seniors who usually relied on family members could now independently set up video calls with overseas relatives. “Happy, confident and connected people is wellness.”
A second round of funding will be available later this year.The ministry also administers the Ethnic Communities Development Fund and the Ethnic Communities Covid-19 Vaccine Uptake Fund.
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