UN-sponsored IT meeting envisages future needs
19 Nov 2005On a cold and snowy Friday morning, ambassadors, ministers, secretaries, CEOs, and entrepreneurs from all over the world passed through computerized security checks to participate in the Seventh United Nations Information and Communication Technologies Task Force (UNICTF) annual conference with the overall theme, “Promoting Enabling Environment for Digital Development” in the old but wholly digitized building of the foreign ministry of Germany in Berlin.
Established by Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 2001, the UN ICT TF brings together representatives of governments, the private sector, civil society, and international organizations in a global effort to harness the immense potential of ICT for promoting development.
In his welcome remarks, Ambassador Martin Lutz, Director General for Economic Affairs and Sustainable Development of the Federal German Government, formally started the session by giving a quick review of the core activities of the Task Force and the success story of ICT’s working groups and regional nodes that lucratively served as a multi-stakeholder mechanism to facilitate and promote collaborative initiatives as regional, sub-regional, and national levels and to mobilize new public and private resources to support ICT-for-development programs and projects.
With the introductory remarks of Jose-Antonio Ocampo, UN Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, Lucio Stance, Minister for Innovation and Technology, Italy, read out the efforts by his government for enabling the environment for digital development at a national and international level. He highly regarded the recent E-Government initiative, GovNet, by Mozambique in which the intranet connects 12 ministries. Referring to the Italian contribution, he dwelt on the ongoing collaborations with Iraq and Jordan in the Middle East, Macedonia and Albania in South East Europe, and Nigeria and Mozambique in Africa.
The plenary session focused on policy and regulatory issues. Jean Michel Hubert, Ambassador, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, France, discussed the factors of institution and capacity building in the IT sector and solutions to provide low cost (affordable) access not only to the developed but also to the rural areas of under developed countries. Panelists involved the participants in finding out the ways to strengthening the institutional capacity building of developing countries in ICT for development policy-making and to enhance their ability to participate in and contribute to international policy-making processes.
Organizers treated the participants to a working lunch where Ambassador Karklins, President of the WSIS PrepCom, made a brief statement on the preparatory process of the Tunis phase of the summit followed by presentation on WTO, e-Commerce, and IT, read by Sacha Wunsh-Vicent of OECD in reference to the Uruguay Round through the Doha Development Agenda.
One of the important sessions of the day was financing ICT for development. The session explored key issues relating to financing ICT for development that emerged out of the discussion of the first phase of the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva in December 2003. The session addressed the changing role of public, private, and not-for-private sectors and the collaboration and contribution of stakeholders in innovative financial mechanisms.
By end of the day, the participants split into three groups for breakout sessions. In these simultaneous sessions, the area of focus for the first group remained on policy and regulatory issues where the moderator, Richard Simpson, took comments, questions, and suggestions. Participants of the second group discussed the new models for financing ICT for development.
The attention and input of private firms and entrepreneurs went to the third group, which discussed the promotion of private sector investment and entrepreneurship.
The first day closed on a 10-dish reception arranged by the Task Force and served by German citizens.
The second day started with opening remarks by Talal Abu-Ghazaleh and moderation by David Gross (Ambassador for US State Department).
Despite being a weekend, the turnout was remarkable as participation crossed over 500 people. As crucial portions of the conference were already discussed, networking breaks “with coffee and tea” remained the centre of attraction for the newcomers and private enterprises. The last plenary session was conducted by Brendan Tuohy, Secretary-General, Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, Ireland, who summed up the deliberations of the preceding and breakout sessions, and identified the area of action and collaboration between stakeholder groups, modalities for engaging stakeholders in innovative partnerships. The Chairman, Jose Maria Figueres Olsen, ended the final session in a closed door meeting with members of the Task Force and gave directions about the next meetings.
Established by Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 2001, the UN ICT TF brings together representatives of governments, the private sector, civil society, and international organizations in a global effort to harness the immense potential of ICT for promoting development.
In his welcome remarks, Ambassador Martin Lutz, Director General for Economic Affairs and Sustainable Development of the Federal German Government, formally started the session by giving a quick review of the core activities of the Task Force and the success story of ICT’s working groups and regional nodes that lucratively served as a multi-stakeholder mechanism to facilitate and promote collaborative initiatives as regional, sub-regional, and national levels and to mobilize new public and private resources to support ICT-for-development programs and projects.
With the introductory remarks of Jose-Antonio Ocampo, UN Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, Lucio Stance, Minister for Innovation and Technology, Italy, read out the efforts by his government for enabling the environment for digital development at a national and international level. He highly regarded the recent E-Government initiative, GovNet, by Mozambique in which the intranet connects 12 ministries. Referring to the Italian contribution, he dwelt on the ongoing collaborations with Iraq and Jordan in the Middle East, Macedonia and Albania in South East Europe, and Nigeria and Mozambique in Africa.
The plenary session focused on policy and regulatory issues. Jean Michel Hubert, Ambassador, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, France, discussed the factors of institution and capacity building in the IT sector and solutions to provide low cost (affordable) access not only to the developed but also to the rural areas of under developed countries. Panelists involved the participants in finding out the ways to strengthening the institutional capacity building of developing countries in ICT for development policy-making and to enhance their ability to participate in and contribute to international policy-making processes.
Organizers treated the participants to a working lunch where Ambassador Karklins, President of the WSIS PrepCom, made a brief statement on the preparatory process of the Tunis phase of the summit followed by presentation on WTO, e-Commerce, and IT, read by Sacha Wunsh-Vicent of OECD in reference to the Uruguay Round through the Doha Development Agenda.
One of the important sessions of the day was financing ICT for development. The session explored key issues relating to financing ICT for development that emerged out of the discussion of the first phase of the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva in December 2003. The session addressed the changing role of public, private, and not-for-private sectors and the collaboration and contribution of stakeholders in innovative financial mechanisms.
By end of the day, the participants split into three groups for breakout sessions. In these simultaneous sessions, the area of focus for the first group remained on policy and regulatory issues where the moderator, Richard Simpson, took comments, questions, and suggestions. Participants of the second group discussed the new models for financing ICT for development.
The attention and input of private firms and entrepreneurs went to the third group, which discussed the promotion of private sector investment and entrepreneurship.
The first day closed on a 10-dish reception arranged by the Task Force and served by German citizens.
The second day started with opening remarks by Talal Abu-Ghazaleh and moderation by David Gross (Ambassador for US State Department).
Despite being a weekend, the turnout was remarkable as participation crossed over 500 people. As crucial portions of the conference were already discussed, networking breaks “with coffee and tea” remained the centre of attraction for the newcomers and private enterprises. The last plenary session was conducted by Brendan Tuohy, Secretary-General, Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, Ireland, who summed up the deliberations of the preceding and breakout sessions, and identified the area of action and collaboration between stakeholder groups, modalities for engaging stakeholders in innovative partnerships. The Chairman, Jose Maria Figueres Olsen, ended the final session in a closed door meeting with members of the Task Force and gave directions about the next meetings.
Reported by : Hasnain Bokhari in The Statesman, Pakistan
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