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About MIDAS -> Background

Background
Mongolian ICT professionals and other interested parties have actively cooperated and participated in workshops and seminars organized by the government, donors and companies.

One of the activities was the participation of some ICT policy makers and leading professionals in Internet policy seminar organized by Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme (APDIP).

ICT professionals have also actively participated in pre-summit series of workshops for the preparation of a draft ICT Vision 2010 and the National ICT summit.

The result of the main cooperation of ICT professionals was the ICT Summit in 1999, initiated by UNDP and Soros Foundation. During this summit policy-makers and stakeholders jointly revised the draft of ICT Vision 2010, Mongolia's blueprint on ICT. This document was ratified by the Mongolian Parliament in 2000. In addition, the National ICT Council was set up, consisting of representatives from government, NGO's, civil societies and the private sector as a representing body of the ICT stakeholders and professionals. The aim of the National ICT Council was to operationalize the ICT Vision 2010.

The National ICT Council has organize several workshops, seminars and other activities in ICT field. One of this is the workshop to formulate a Draft ICT Plan of Action for Mongolia over the period of 2000 to 2003.

In the year 1999 the National ICT Council in cooperation with UNDP Mongolia, APDIP and Mongolian Foundation for Open society (Soros foundation) started the development of the MIDAS (Mongolia Information Development Application Scheme) project.

The National ICT Council was initially selected to be the implementing agency.

The aim of the MIDAS project is to support the government in the creation of an intellectually geared society and in the development of information and communications technology (ICT) in Mongolia.

The MIDAS project facilitates the selection of subprojects for grant services in order to support the implementation of ICT Vision 2010 - the 'blueprint' for ICT development in Mongolia.

There are 17 subprojects that were selected from 76 applicants to the grant competition from both rural and urban areas.

Projects were selected according to the following indicators: new applications for ICT, distribution of the finished products, probability of project implementation, and possibilities for sustainability.

The National ICT Council was acting without any legal status and permanent secretariat. On the other hand, they are expected to initiate ICT-related activities such as influencing to organize regular activities and to follow-up.

Thus, the National ICT Council has established the MIDAS Secretariat, which was responsible for day-to-day implementation of the project and assists the Council's activities.

During the period of MIDAS project implementation, the members of the National ICT Council were working more closely and they are also known as a MIDAS Council.

In order to broaden the Council's activities and to have a legal status, the MIDAS Council members registered the MIDAS project as an NGO named "MIDAS" or Mongolian Information Development ASsociation.