WSIS Intersessional Meeting
16 Jul 2003On behalf of the Coordinating Committee Of Business Interlocuters (CCBI) which is chaired by the International Chamber Of Commerce, and on behalf of the United Nations Information and Communication Taskforce (UN ICT TF), Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh gave two interventions during the WSIS Intersessional Meeting held on July 15th to 18th in Paris at the UNESCO headquarters.
The WSIS Intersessional Meeting aims at advancing the negotiations on the Summit on the basis of the documents generated by the PrepCom and the results of the work carried during the intersessional period.
In his first intervention on behalf of CCBI/ICC, Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh, Chair of the ICC Commission on E-Business, Information Technologies and Telecom (EBITT), requested the WSIS to clearlyadvocate a policy framework that promotes competition, including increased trade liberalization, and private sector investment.
The Draft Declaration of Principles and action plan focus primarily of general political objects and not enough on the fundamental building blocks of an information society, as Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh has pointed out. He identified the building blocks as secure infrastructure which introduce competition, and provide favorable regulatory environment to create the framework necessary to ensure deployment/development of the information infrastructure by business; A sound and equitable education and health care system; and a recognition of the benefits of ICT applications, such as e-learning, e-health and e-government.
Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh stated that "the road to promoting the Information Society starts with the simple existence of the infrastructure to carry information through ICTs, without that infrastructure we will not get to our common objectives.” He called the summit to prioritize the creation of the necessary conditions to enable businesses to contribute to economic and social growth.
In his second intervention on behalf of the UN ICT TF, Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh, vice chair of the task force, stated that the summit should have the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) as its heart and that multi-stakeholder involvement is imperative.
"What one cannot quantify, one cannot improve" Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh said. He pointed out the inclusion of some quantifiable benchmarks in the draft Plan of Action. He added that the task force could further strengthen the documents as it developed a system of quantifiable goals, benchmarks and indicators that would serve to assess the impact of ICTs and exactly how they contributed to the progress towards achieving the MDGs.
"Shaping the global Information Society will need an effective multi-stakeholder mechanism to measure progress of implementation of the outcomes of the Summit", he said. He added that the UN ICT Task Force can provide a platform on which such a mechanism could be created involving all relevant players, including governments and multilateral organizations, such as ITU, UNESCO, UNDP.
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It should be noted that the Principals of the WSIS host countries and executive secretariat invited the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) to create the CCBI as a vehicle through which to mobilize and coordinate the involvement of the worldwide business community in the processes leading to and culminating in the Summit. ICC leads the private-sector effort to provide substantive input into the Summit, and mobilizes the private sector to participate in the preparatory phases and at the Summit itself. Other CCBI participating organizations include Business Council of the United Nations, Business Industry Advisory Committee of the OECD, Global Business Dialogue on E-Commerce, Brazilian Chamber of E-Commerce, Global Information Infrastructure Commission, World Economic Forum, World Information Technology and Services Alliance, to name a few. For more information, kindly visit http://www.iccwbo.org/home/e_business/wsis.asp
The United Nations Information and Communication Technologies Task Force (UN ICT TF) was established to help build universal broad-based partnerships and find creative means to spread the benefits of the digital revolution. It was officially launched and inaugurated by Secretary General Kofi Annan at the United Nations Headquarters in New York on November 20, 2001. It is comprised of an unprecedented mixture of worldwide representatives from governments, the private sector, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), foundations and United Nations bodies, in a co-operative effort to build digital opportunities and leverage the multitude of efforts to bridge the digital divide. For more information, kindly visit www.unicttaskforce.org
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