9. CTSCs in other parts of the World

According to the EEC bulletin "The future of rural society" (Commission of the European Communities, 1988) rural society throughout the European Community is undergoing radical changes similar to those in Scandinavia. The report points out that among a number of experiments with telecom-munications and IT services in Europe, CTSCs ".. are probably the most com-prehensive, the most well-developed and the most interesting ", and proposes to evaluate the CTSC model using pilot projects in Europe, CTSCs have been established in most of the Western Europe countries.

The next step will be to establish a closer co-operation between these centres, with access to common data bases and exchange of services and competencies.

In the countries of Eastern and Central Europe it is known of a CTSC in operation in Hungary, and plans are under way to organise a CTSC Symposium in Budapest, specificly aimed at the countries of Eastern and Central Europe (CCE and CIS), to promote development of CTSCs. Teleservice centres has also been established in e.g. Australia, Canada and Brazil, and there are plans under way in a large number of countries throughout the world.

The ITU has decided in the Buenos Aires Action Plan (BAAP) to promote the use of telecentres in a number of pilot projects world-wide. Several projects are now in preparation,. as you will read about in the following Chapter 10.