The Theme: “Advancing the Caribbean through Information and Communication” ST. GEORGE’S, GRENADA, FRIDAY, JULY 15th, 2009_ Ladies and gentlemen, I am extremely honoured by your gracious invitation to address your esteemed organization on the occasion of your 25th annual conference. Twenty five years of excellent service to your membership and indeed the Caribbean, is certainly a major milestone in the life of any organization. I wish to applaud your achievements and to congratulate you on your growth and progress to date. Your conference theme; “Advancing the Caribbean through Information and Communication.” is consistent with your mission and work over the years and I look forward to your successful deliberations. Ladies and gentlemen, It is my view that as leaders of the region, one of our fundamental responsibilities, is to promote human development and ultimately improve the lives of our people. While we have made considerable socio-economic progress as a region, many vulnerabilities and challenges remain. These include natural disasters, climate change, rising unemployment, increasing crime, high debt levels, persistent poverty and our inability to provide adequate opportunities for our young people. A striking scenario for me is the fact that we produce approximately one hundred and fifty thousand high school graduates annually. Not more than forty thousand are absorbed by our regional tertiary institutions. This means that the majority of our young graduates do not necessarily have ready, easy access to structured further training and development. This massive gap needs to be addressed urgently. Moreover, all the aforementioned challenges are exacerbated by the current world recession, culminating from a series of crises. Given the foregoing, any meaningful advancement of the Caribbean will clearly have to seek to address all these vulnerabilities and challenges. This is certainly no mean task. As such, we need to ensure that we utilize every available resource available to us to do so. Information and Communication Technology is now widely accepted by everyone as a critical resource that can be marshaled in our efforts to enhance human development, provide employment opportunities and empower our people. Information is an agent of change and empowerment; and access to information helps people identify and seize opportunities to grow, to develop and to improve their lives, their families and their communities. Access to information makes it possible for people to actively participate in their community, in the economy, in government, and in the development process itself. The ability to share information helps overcome barriers to communication and encourages exchange and collaboration. What makes information sharing so pervasive today is the human need for constant interaction, knowledge, entertainment and its facilitation by Information and communication technology. As a consequence, we need to accelerate our use and embrace of this technology. As a region we must begin to position ICT as a fundamental pillar for our socioeconomic development. Recognizing this, infrastructure initiatives and development strategies incorporating ICT must be promoted and utilized throughout the region. Ladies and gentlemen, we must ensure that our national policies adequately reflect comprehensive and integrated strategies for harnessing and exploiting this potential. This is necessary if we are to bridge the digital divide even between countries of the region. We are aware for example of Trinidad and Tobago progress in e-governance with ‘Fast Forward’ followed by Jamaica and Barbados. Here, I want to recognize the important role being played by organizations like CANTO, the Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU), CARICAD and others in narrowing the gap and helping to achieve the harmonization of policies and legislation. Two areas of focus for the Caribbean in my view, must be the provision of universal access to the Internet for our people and the acceleration of government services online. In the case of the latter, it is urgent as efficient government service is a sine qua non for increased competitiveness. This is strategic against the background that The World Bank Doing Business Index, a ranking of government efficiency as it relates to business facilitation, reveals that every Caribbean country needs to improve its procedures, processes and service delivery considerably. Caribbean countries are ranked between 34 and 154 on the index. Here again, the use of ICT is pertinent as observation, learning and decision-making are facilitated, and business transactions are expanded and accelerated. Opportunities can be identified and acted on more easily. Markets operate more efficiently and are more accessible. All these lead to business-related efficiencies, faster turnover, increased productivity and profitability, especially in the services sector. As we collectively seek to advance our Caribbean through the use of Information and Communication, I wish to reiterate that the following five pillars, as identified by the Regional ICT Steering Committee, should form the cornerstone of our ICT Strategic Framework: 1. Firstly, Capacity Building is essential to developing the requisite skills in order for CARICOM citizens to fully benefit from the Information Society. Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) can contribute to more efficiency and better quality in educational services and can facilitate improved access to broader target groups. The shortage of personnel with the requisite skills to use and apply ICTs is a severe constraint limiting ICT deployment in some parts of the region. In this context the Caribbean Knowledge and Learning Network holds significant promise. 2. Secondly, Access & Connectivity is one of the essential foundations of the Information Society. Accordingly, the countries of the region should be committed to taking action to overcome the digital divides within the region particularly in devising appropriate universal access policies and in improving the underlying broadband infrastructure. 3. Thirdly, a supportive and transparent legal and regulatory framework is necessary to generate security and confidence in the infrastructure. Such a legal framework can help to facilitate electronic transactions, protect consumers (including minors) within the electronic space and foster innovation through the protection of intellectual property. In particular, Governments should foster a supportive, transparent, pro-competitive and predictable policy, legal and regulatory framework, which provides appropriate incentives to investment and community development. 4. Fourthly, Information Society Indicators need to be collated. These statistical indicators are useful to facilitate performance evaluation and benchmarking for implemented programmes and for tracking progress in the use of ICTs to achieve development goals. In its Action Plan for the development of the Information Society, the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) emphasizes the need for international and regional organizations to assess and report regularly on universal accessibility of nations to ICTs, with the aim of creating equitable opportunities for the growth of ICT sectors of developing countries. 5. Fifthly, ICT applications can support sustainable social and economic development within a number of sectors. The ICT applications of focus include: (a) E-Government as mentioned before. (b) E-Business (including eCommerce): the use of ICT for execution of business processes including customer service delivery (c) E-Learning: the use of ICT as the primary medium for instruction (d) E-Environment: the use of ICT as a tool for environmental protection and the sustainable use of natural resources Ladies and Gentlemen, we have made some progress as a region but much more needs to be done. · We must continue to promote the greatest access possible to information and ICTs that are consistent with our national and human development goals. This means that everyone and every group should be included, no one should be left behind; · We must adopt an integrated and pro-development approach, with positive impacts on people, rather than technology deployment, as the main outcome; · We must promote partnerships between development actors, especially public-private partnerships. Here, your role as CANTO members are critical. · Importantly, we should be guided by the reality that fundamentally, all information belongs to the public and it should be in the public domain unless compelling reasons exist to withhold it. · We must remember that there is a need for local relevant and appropriate content as an integral component of our development. Policies that recognize and encourage the creation of local content are critical if we are to preserve and maintain our identity as a people. · We need to give special attention to issues related to poverty alleviation, local and community development, gender equality, the digital divide and the role of ICTs in dealing with HIV/AIDS, and disasters if we are to advance as a people. · We need to strive for greater synergy between the various programmes and actors to accelerate implementation and to add real value. I am firmly of the view that as a Caribbean people, with a history of resilience, fortitude and collective strength, we will continue our advancement in the pursuit of improving our standard of living. Information and communications can assist considerably in this process and I wish to urge strongly that we embrace and maximize this opportunity. I wish your conference success and thank the CANTO family for your kind hospitality. I thank you.