Theme: Business Technology: An Enabler in your Economy
Venue: Fairmont Southampton Hotel, Hamilton, Bermuda Date: November 1-3, 2009
1.0 IntroductionThere are two principal flagship events of WITSA. These are
* The World Congress on IT (WCIT) hosted biennially by different member countries, (the next one will be hosted by The Netherlands from May 25-27, 2010); and
* the Global Public Policy Summit (GPPS).
These events however run in alternate years.
This year’s edition of the biennial Global Public Summit of the World Information Technology and Services Alliance (WITSA) ended recently in Hamilton, Bermuda. The four-day event which took place from October 31 to November 3, 2009 at the prestigious Fairmont Southhampton Hotel attracted more than 25 countries with the robust attendance of the World Bank (WB), World Trade Organisation (WTO), International Telecommunications Union (ITU), Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), Internet Governance Forum (IGF) and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The theme of the Summit was Business Technology: An Enabler in your Economy. This was another opportunity to underscore the critical importance of ICT for economic growth and national development through appropriate policy frameworks and laws.
1.1 Pre-Summit WorkshopTheme: Incubators and Associations – Catalyst in Building an ICT Sector
The Summit began with a pre-summit Workshop with the theme: Incubators and Associations- Catalyst in Building an ICT Sector. The workshop underscored the role of incubators and associations as imperative for innovation and the building of a vibrant ICT sector. Speakers from Argentina (Dr Jorge Cassino), USA (Mr Allen Miller), Trinidad and Tobago (Mr Rabindra Jeggernauth), Jamaica (Dainsworth Richards), Kenya (Waudo Siganga) and Malaysia (Looi Kien Leong) made pertinent presentations in this regard.
1.2 OpeningThe Summit was declared opened on November 1 in the Fairmont Southampton Hotel Amphitheater by the Bermuda Prime Minister, Ewart Brown who also unveiled the new WITSA logo. He also hosted the delegates to a dinner at the legendary Governor-General Residence. The Egyptian Minister of Communications and Information Technology led his country’s delegation to the Summit while Mrs Yuwa Naps, the Edo State Senior Special Adviser on ICT was the only Nigerian Government personnel in our delegation of 6 CEO members of the Nigerian ICT Industry.
1.4 Nigerian DelegationIn the Nigerian delegation are:
* Dr Jimson Olufuye, President ITAN & CEO Kontemporary Konsulting Ltd
* Ms Arinola Akinyemi, ITAN Treasurer & CEO Omar Ventures Ltd
* Mr Andrew Okonye, ITAN Ass Fin. Secretary & CEO New Trends Computers Ltd
* Mr Emmanuel Amos, Ex-Officio & CEO Programmos Software Ltd
* Mrs Yuwa Naps, Edo State Senior Special Assistant on ICT
1.5 The SummitThe Summit was divided into seven parts viz
* State of the global ICT industry;
* Information security and privacy;
* ICT and economic stimulus plans;
* Internet and Internet governance;
* ICT for the environment;
* International institutions and what role they play in this arena of policy and ICT; and
* Future technology trends.
1.6 The State of the Global ICT IndustryMr Robert Flanagan of the Global Insight (WITSA partner on global ICT research) indicated that there are some green sprouts appearing, showing signals of economic recovery and growth for the world economy and for the ICT Industry. The Global Insight expert noted five driving forces namely:
* Convergence;
* Mobile leapfrogging;
* Expanded broadband;
* Empowered citizens; and
* ICT for healthcare
1.7 Information Security and PrivacyIn the area of information security and privacy protection it was said that information security and privacy protection is everyone’s business and WITSA encourages a strong public/private partnership to address these important issues. Collaborative solutions were recommended between our industry and policymakers so we can minimize the threats from cyber attacks and to
ensure that our systems and data remain protected. It was also noted that we have to have an appropriate balance between privacy protection and information security. We want one to complement the other, but we do not want an imbalance where privacy protectionmay indeed inhibit information security and cyber security approaches.
In fact, the session challenged WITSA to be more active in the information security arena perhaps by:
* Starting a partnership or pilot partnership with various stakeholders involved in information security in Africa, for example;
* Creating some international watch and learning network including WITSA members and others
* Looking at strategies regarding malicious cyber attack; and
* Establishing a website or portal hosted by WITSA that would provide security and privacy information as well as serving as resource for industry and government to go to learn about these issues and solutions being suggested.
An innovative approach to this issue was proposed by Prof. Mike Nelson of Georgetown University, Washington DC who while alluding to the Bermuda status as the hub of World Insurance to get the insurance companies involved in information security insurance as a way of prompting appropriate information security requirements against cyber attacks.
1.8 ICT and Economic Stimulus PlansThe panel of government and business experts had a lively discussion on the role of governments in providing economic stimulus and public sector investment, the critical role of innovation as an economic driver, and the role of ICT skills.
On the role of government stimulus in ICT projects during a recession, a general wariness was expressed about such government programs even as the panelists recognized that on a microeconomic level the intervention might be beneficial. There was concern that broadband investments such as the massive ones in Australia and elsewhere could distort competition and be inefficient. There was also concerns about the long term effects on the economies, especially in the US and Europe because of the debt structure there.
There was also a lively debate on innovation in which all the panel members and many in the audience contributed. They recognized that while the spur of innovation had come from individuals and businesses, governments did have a role to play to enable the correctclimate and to work on global solutions that related particularly to copyright and intellectual property rights. There was also an interesting debate on whether foreign direct investment helped innovation with contrary arguments being made on the need forinnovation to be considered as more of a lifecycle issue.
And finally the panel members talked about IT skills where they saw the real issue was to ensure that the ability for people to move globally across borders and that there was concern that government should not mandate certain types of skills that could beincompatible with local employment opportunities. There was a general consensus that the link between skills training and employment opportunities needed to be stronger.
1.9 The Internet and Internet GovernanceThe Internet governance panel was probably the calmest debate on Internet governance in some years which may indicate either we had the right people or we did not but we surely had the major decision makers on internet governance from ICANN, the United NationsInternet Governance Forum, and the Internet Society (ISOC). The panel members concurred that WITSA is on target with the following principals:
* Keep the Internet open and accessible to all;
* Ensure reliability and security;
* Recognize the multistakeholder nature of the Internet governance forum and its continuation for further policy development discussions;
* Strengthen and broaden the involvement in leadership in industry in these relevant forums; and
* Ensure that the global public policy in governing national systems enable the use of ICT products.
The panel did challenge WITSA and the private sector to maintain strong private sector leadership and participation in ICANN and Internet Governance Forum meetings. There must be strong private sector involvement to ensure the continuation of the private sectorled, multistakholder approach to the Internet and Internet Governance issues.
1.10 ICT for the EnvironmentIn the area of ICT for the environment, the first part of the session presented data and trends on global warming and climate change as a way to show urgency and importance to this challenging issue. It was not a positive message in many respects but at the same time it was a way to draw our attention to it and the seriousness of it.
The second part of the panel focused on why climate change matters for the ICT industry.The panelists talked about various projects and approaches that certain ICT organizations or companies were doing to address the issue including recycling, reduction of powerconsumption in the data center and by ICT products. It was also pointed out that most policy makers are focused on the carbon footprint of the ICT industry or, as it was pointed out, the two percent of the problem and did not pay enough attention to the fact that ICT could be the solution to the other 98 percent of the problem. It was noted that ICT can help other sectors to address the climate change challenges successfully and effectively and our work would have to be focused more on promoting how we have solutions for the remaining 98 percent.
There was a challenge to WITSA by the panel to engage more fully in the 2 percent/ 98 percent debate and that WITSA should gather more case studies to show the effectiveness of ICT to helping other industries to address the environmental challenges. It was suggestedthat there should be:
* An action plan created and presented on this matter at the World Congress (WCIT) in The Netherlands in 2010; and
* There should be a follow-up program to reach out and to talk about the results globally in order to raise awareness and get people to focus on how ICT can be part of the solution as well as our industry cleaning up and taking care of the two percent part in our sector.
1.11 International Institutions and What Role They Play in this Arena of Policy and ICTThe next panel was on the international institutions that have traditionally focused on global policies. That is to say, the World Trade Organization (WTO) in terms of global trading rules, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in terms of a think tank for global economic studies and best practice policies, the World Bank for development advisory assistance to developing countries, in particular on how to deregulate, regulate appropriately, implement policies that help to create economic growth and development in their countries, including the use of ICT products and services, and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) inpromoting the telecommunications infrastructure.
The representatives of these institutions were asked to give concrete evidence that their institutions have a positive role to play in promoting ICT and expanding economies and we asked them if these institutions were simply relics of the past. To no big surprise, thefour representatives did rise to the challenge and presented a lively defense of their institutions, including what we had hoped for - facts, figures and good concrete data. The WTO representative said that this period has been the longest delay between trade rounds as we await a successful conclusion of the Doha Round and that WTO agreements did provide stimulus, especially the basic telecomagreement and deregulation approaches, for ICT products and services at that time and going forward.
In general, the World Trade Organization provides a legal framework for international trading rules that investors and traders rely upon as they do their business globally. And this is an important aspect. In addition, the WTO representative said if the WTO was not there to help out globally how would we arrange international trade as it would be difficult to arrange such global rules though bilateral arrangements.
The World Bank representative pointed out that the World Bank was quick to infuse capital into the marketplace in response to the economic downturn and the World Bank also has a plan to make sure that in the post-crisis period the Bank will continue its lending program and its advisory services, and we heard about one recent project in areas of trade facilitation.
The OECD representative did say he was sure he was invited to talk about the beneficial aspects of ICT because the OECD studies have shown that ICT does matter and is directly linked to economic growth. In addition, he pointed out that in the recent economic crisis, governments were coming to the OECD to seek more advice and studies and it is a forum for policy coordination and cooperation on these issues and, hopefully, on issues mattering to us in the future as the OECD addresses technology and communications issues.
The ITU representative said that this institution is the technical advisors to promote the telecommunications infrastructure and interconnection with outreach to developing countries in particular.
But many in the audience asked about the coordination and cooperation among those international institutions and what were they doing to reach out to national governments so that these governments could understand the opportunities that the programs presentedor, more importantly, the obligations that the agreements imposed upon them. And here we had an interesting and lively discussion that many officials, especially in the developing countries, did not fully understand or fully know the facilities made available by all these institutions and that this was indeed a problem for coordination and reaching out to these groups. And so it was suggested that there be more raising of awareness by these institutions, and more training of officials, regulators, trade negotiators. This led to an opportunity for WITSA to be part of the network to link to the national governments and to encourage them to look to these institutions for whatever projects and programs that may be beneficial to bring ICT to their countries. Thus, WITSA could try to assist in overcoming the problem of a lack of awareness, a lack of coordination, between national governments and these international institutions.
So these representatives said these international institutions are not relics of the past, but like rapid changes in technology in our industry, there have been rapid changes in policy makers, trade negotiators and government officials that know about these institutions and policies and so it is an ongoing learning process that WITSA must continue to help countries and our associations to link into these international institutions.
1.12 Future Technology TrendsFinally, the innovation panel was asked to identify what would be the next generation technologies, or next new technology wave, if you will. Sensors were identified, cloud computing with ubiquitous networks, consumer driven personalization to remove complexities for the user were also mentioned. The panel talked about the progression from hardware to software, the people who use the technology, and policies. It was noted that the key component in all future technologies is training people and having them understand the technologies going forward.
2.0 Other Highlights WITSA unveiled two new initiatives namely
* The G20 ICT Policy Network to support the new G20 Group of nations. Based on the submission of Nigerian delegation, leading developing nations like Nigeria will be part of this Policy Network as we work towards the Vision 20 2020.
* The second initiative of WITSA is the B2B Portal launched to facilitate business between WITSA members’ members having established WITSA Business Centres in select national associations of which Nigeria is one.
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