The World Bank's new chief economist for Africa recently penned an entry on his new blog with the title: Is information the solution? His comments drew on pioneering research in Uganda by World Bank staffers in the 1990s on the role that information played in ensuring better development outcomes.

Across the world, the information age has fundamentally changed the ways in which producers of research think about how their output can be more widely disseminated to ensure development impact. African organisations have grasped some of these challenges, even though the continent lags in internet connectivity and internet access is expensive. But with connectivity rates across Africa expected to rise rapidly over the next few years, the unfolding opportunities of the internet must be grabbed by greater numbers of African civil society agencies and networks, research institutes and development agencies.

International donor agencies now routinely promote the dissemination of information, research findings and outputs generated from projects they fund. The buzz word of evidence-based research reflects this interest. World Bank interest stems largely from the 2004 World Development Report, 'Making Services Work for Poor People'. The World Bank now funds social accountability networks in three regions of the world.

Against this broad background, a group of information specialists, led by the Institute for Development Studies (IDS) at the University of Sussex, are exploring what it means to be a "knowledge intermediary" in the age of internet. It recently co-hosted an international workshop in Centurion, South Africa. The on-going discussions promise to give far greater coherence and strategic direction to what many regard as an emerging sector in the development debate.

The discussion document prepared for the Centurion workshop noted that research brokers and intermediaries act as the "in-between". They facilitate information and communication flows by standing in the space between policymakers, civil society organisations, development practitioners and researchers. IDS's Eldis project is famous for its sifting and profiling of new research outputs. It has been followed by similar projects in other research institutes across the globe.

One hypothesis discussed at the workshop was that knowledge intermediaries represented a "distinct, new communication structure". Another was that their "unique contribution" lay in their commitment to highlighting multiple perspectives to create a "rich information environment to support evidence-based policymaking".

Knowledge intermediaries, I would suggest, possess much power to shape development discourse. One way in which they do so is through their constant sifting and aggregating of perspectives, framed by their own exposure and commitments to development outcomes.

The impact of collating daily newsflashes on topical policy issues for posting on the websites of regional networks is amplified hugely when they are distributed by RSS feeds to subscribers across Africa and beyond. RSS are web feed formats used to publish frequently updated work. They take feeds from many sites and channel them to one personalized place, such as an iGoogle page. This allows users a far more immediate and simple overview of policy issues.

But, as I recently discovered when setting up my own iGoogle page after the Centurion conference, major African organisations do not yet include RSS facilities on their websites. The websites of the African Union, the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, and the African Development Bank have yet to discover the power of this technology.Even Codesria, the influential organisation linking African academics, does not use an RSS feed to disseminate its work across the continent.

Africa does though bring some stellar examples to the world stage in this respect. Pambazuka News, a weekly digest of social justice issues, is a model in how to bring news of policy developments to a mass audience. If knowledge intermediaries, in Africa and elsewhere, want to heighten their impact they need to know as much as possible about their audience when making editorial decisions in the sifting and aggregating process.

One of the pioneering African virtual networks, the Southern African Regional Poverty Network (SARPN), quickly built an international reputation as a source for diverse research outputs on key policy issues on poverty. Its users are located in universities and in government and development agencies. Of course websites are accessed by an elite group. But knowledge intermediaries accept that knowledge is then, in various ways, passed on to a wider group of people.

What more can be done to promote the strength of knowledge intermediaries in Africa? One option would be to explore partnerships with northern institutions with more experience of the tools and techniques involved. Another would be for African agencies to explore partnerships amongst themselves, linking their information outputs, to ensure a higher profile for African voices.

Imagine how influential an "Addis Briefings" series could be, modelled on the lessons of the "Brussels Briefings", run by EUFORIC. Those African NGOs with satellite offices in Addis Ababa, interacting with the African Union and the UN Economic Commission for Africa, would perform a hugely important service to the rest of the continent if they were to collaborate on such a project.

Richard Humphries consults to various websites and African networks, including ANSA-Africa. His blog on knowledge intermediary issues in Africa can be accessed at: http://www.africanki.blogspot.com.

He can be contacted at: humphriesrg@gmail.com

This article was originally commissioned by Inter Press Service: http://www.ipsnews.net/new_focus/changelives/opinion6.asp