The Galapagos Islands are one of the world’s top ecological tourism destinations. Nonetheless, one of the most significant challenges in the islands is the lack of connectivity, which is limited due to the absence of a direct fiber optic link to the mainland of Ecuador. Local telecommunication operators using the O3B (Other 3 Billion) satellite network are currently providing access to the Internet. This network is restricted by the available bandwidth and high costs associated with the service. With the goal to provide improved access to education and communication services and resources, a Community Intranet Pilot was launched in 2018 on the island of San Cristobal. This community network introduced a variety of servers for sharing educational resources between the five schools on the island. The Community Intranet Pilot was implemented using a client-server model over a combination of fiber optic network backbone and wireless communications for the last mile. Workshops to educate and empower end-users on the use of the system have been enthusiastically embraced with the goals of closing the digital divide, enhancing collaboration, and encourage the sharing of resources.

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• Galapagos Islands, Ecuador

• Remote and rural communities

The Intranet system will be replicated on the island of Santa Cruz, the most populated island in the Galapagos Islands. This will allow 11 additional schools to access the resources available in the system. Furthermore, an inter-island link will connect the Intranet networks on each island creating a greater Archipelago Intranet System. Ultimately, this will contribute to the sustainable development of the Galapagos Islands by enabling access to ICT tools and collaboration between stakeholders in the Galapagos Islands. We are also working with other communities, including schools in Guatemala, to provide access to educational resources for remote schools that do not have access to the Internet. There are also other opportunities within other regions of Ecuador that we will explore to expand our work to other communities. In particular, the topology used by this system can be replicated to implement offline educational servers in remote communities without access to the Internet.

The Ministry of Education’s Regional Office is enthusiastically supporting the new infrastructure to provide access to the additional educational resources included in the servers to the teachers and students in the schools. Furthermore, the Regional Office is also very interested in creating a virtual library for the community, as there are no physical libraries available to the community members on the island of San Cristobal. The Regional Office of the Ministry of Education is a key player for sustaining the operation of the project in time as well as making sure that content available is relevant to the goal of improving the Quality of Education in the Galapagos Islands. Additional key stakeholders include ElecGalapagos, the local utility company with access to fiber-optic infrastructure and the Governing Council, the maximum government authority in the Galapagos Islands.

Our plan in the coming year is to explore the participation of visitors to the Islands as stewards, in collaboration with local providers, of each community, based on the co-creation of shared value. Tourists will be invited to visit the schools where presentations will be made about the role of technology and connectivity to realize the slogan suggested by high school students in 2013 when the EcoHelix model was first introduced: Promoting and Conserving our Enchantment. The incorporation of tourists as beneficiaries of the Intranet represents a promising step forward toward sustainability by closing the gap between local providers in the tourism value change and visitors.

The Galapagos Intranet Initiative not only addresses multiple sustainable development goals, but it also aligns with WSIS values as follows: 1. Information and communications technology are key tools to realize sustainable development, and it is our conviction that young students can play a transformational role in the connectivity transformation 2. Bridging the digital divide and promoting digital literacy for older members of the Galapagos communities 3. Enabling environment: the Intranet network will encourage more ICT projects to be established in the archipelago, with significant benefits to all the stakeholders involved 4. Human rights in the information society, by promoting opportunities for locals to have easy access to relievable relevant content. 5. Building confidence and security in the use of information and communications technologies, by providing a quality service much better than the satellite internet the Galapagos currently uses. 6. Enhanced cooperation among all stakeholders in the public, private, civic sectors, academia, and the media.