WHAT ABOUT THEM

Information Technology has made possible trade without barriers and tremendous economic expansions. But isn’t globalization also the main reason why rich countries have become richer and poor countries gone poorer?

You can check your Facebook account even in the wee hours of the morning. But what about those who have not even seen a computer? You can submit a three-page report on World War II in less than an hour with Wikipedia. But what about those whose only sources of information are tattered pages of a book found in the only shelf of their undersized library? You can hear news of Microsoft resolving the problem of how to dispose all those heaps of cash. But what about those homeless children who do not even wear decent clothes on their backs? You can enjoy the benefits of globalization. But what about them?

Take your country for example. Multinational companies use third world countries like the Philippines for their upstream operations. Production sites in Laguna or Davao or Tarlac manufacture their products because labor here is a hundredfold cheaper. Then the finished products are shipped to another company and then to another and another until you see them in retail stores with price tags unimaginable to those factory workers in the Philippines who worked their behinds off for them. You can see AyalaLand stretched out outside UP or Convergys billboards advertising for easy money or IBM hiring another set of IT team. But you can’t see how the rest of the country is clueless of the wonders of the web and left behind not only in terms of real disposable incomes but also in new developments and paradigm shifts. Yes we are struggling to cope with the rising tigers of Asia, where once we were even on top of them. We are seeking for the best investors that could see potential in our resources – to be able to show the world that we could be as industrialized as anyone of them. But can we really do it by leaving behind those who are not apt to learn new technologies and join the flow of innovation?

A nation is most progressive not because of a million computers, but because of a million citizens literate to use them.