Deputy Ministers of Communications & Telecommunications and Postal Services to hand over the SAnote and engage with Stakeholders on the Digital Television Migration Programme
On Friday, 24th February 2017, the Deputy Minister of Communications Ms Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams and Deputy Minister of Telecommunications and Postal Services Professor Hlengiwe Mkhize, will hand over the SAnote to a visually impaired community radio presenter.
The SAnote is a locally developed portable talking computer for the Blind. This CSIR Meraka Institute innovation is a multilingual, user-friendly and affordable device that is designed, developed, manufactured and distributed in South Africa. It is ready-to-use out-of-the-box, with customisable software.
The SAnote emanated from the National Accessibility Programme (NAP), conceptualised in 2003 and developed by the CSIR in partnership with a representative group of Disabled Persons’ Organisations (DPOs) and the Office on the Status of Disabled Persons (OSDP) in the Presidency.
NAP was a five-year research and development initiative aimed at addressing the marginalisation of people with disabilities from the mainstream economy and society, through the use of information and communication technology (ICT).
The CSIR invested funding for its development from the Department of Science and Technology (DST) and the then Department of Communications (DoC) (now Department of Telecommunications and Postal Services (DTPS). The SAnote also features the Qfrency voices which were co-funded by the Department of Arts and Culture (DAC).
The SAnote handover forms an integral part of the DTT stakeholder engagement and advocacy campaign; and is in this respect focusing on persons with disabilities. This is based on an essential benefit of the DTT migration process which is to provide services for the hard of hearing and visually impaired (through subtitles and large scripts).
SAnote will be distributed by the South African National Council of the Blind (SANCB) at an introductory retail price of R 7 500 (including VAT) for the first 50 devices. The software will be supported by the CSIR.
Members of the media are hereby invited to the handover function which will take place as follows:
Date: Friday, 24 February 2017
Time: 10h00
Venue: SANCB, 514 White Street, Muckleneuk, Pretoria
Journalists will be afforded interviews and photo opportunities.
RSVPs: Pakeng Matsetse on 082 297 9556 or pakeng@gcis.gov.za.
Enquiries:
Peter Gumede
Cell: 083 570 8080
Nthabeleng Mokitimi-Dlamini
Cell: 073 222 5522
Bandile Sikwane
Cell: 084 603 0922
