These presentations, discussions and interventions will lead to the drafting of a document with recommendations for consideration by the ministers. The ministers are then expected to sign what would be termed the “Wellington Document” at the end of their meetings that will clear the path to quicker facilitation and implementation of ICTs in the islands region.
The Forum secretariat flagged off the proceedings by familiarising participants with the salient features of the Pacific Plan and its Digital strategy.
Among the issues discussed were the recently completed Mobile Roaming Report, the telecom report and a proposed regional blueprint for regulation. Discussions on the mobile roaming report revealed that the Cook Islands took as many as 15 months to implement roaming. Going by that yardstick, Niue said it would probably take them longer than that.
Potential roaming volumes are based on visitor volumes. Therefore smaller countries look with low tourist and visitor turnovers look inherently unviable to support roaming commercially. Issues related to roaming are more commercial than regulatory. There are a number of technology options that smaller countries can look into in terms of viability and Australia said it had committed funds of A$350,000 to conduct studies on which was the best way forward, but not many countries had responded to that offer.
Samoa says it will work in terms of a clearing-house approach for the Pacific Islands since individually some of these countries will always find it difficult to justify the costs.
The Pacific Islands Telecom Association (PITA) said it had suggested a similar clearing-house concept two years ago with New Zealand taking on that role. But only one Pacific Island country had responded.
The Telecom Report, funded by AusAID has identified potential for cooperation in infrastructure, market development, the establishment of a Pacific-wide regulatory authority called PICTEA and the formation of a Pacific Council for Digital future (PCDF) – a public-private body.
The recommendations were widely welcomed by the participants and Fiji, the Cook Islands, Australia, New Zealand, Samoa, Tonga and the Marshall Islands have expressed willingness to form a task force to drive these recommendations forward. The terms of reference for the task force will be proposed by secretariat.
The Secretariat of Pacific Community’s (SPC) presentation demonstrated how ICTs had helped in spreading awareness of communicable and non-communicable diseases in recent times. One slide showed peaks in messages posted on websites after a disease outbreak in the region. It also noted the successes of PfNet in the Solomon Islands and projects in Yap where ICT-related disease control measures are being implemented.
The South Pacific Geosciences Commission (SOPAC) said it had successfully rolled out its ICT strategy by “mainstreaming ICT” which included assistance with e-government, telecentres, disaster management, remote sensing and the important map server project.
SOPAC said it was important to factor ICT itself into disaster management plans to avoid a repeat of communication failure that happens every once in a while not only following natural disasters but also technological failures like last year’s satellite failure that put many islands out of reach for days.
PITA echoed SOPAC’s thoughts recommending redundancy to be built in connectivity mechanisms. Some countries were seriously considering investing in back-up systems like submarine cables following last year’s satellite failure, it said.
The University of the South Pacific spoke of how greater bandwidths had facilitated increased ICT facilities in its units throughout the region while also remarking that regulatory and commercial considerations had prevented the sharing of this bandwidth bonanza with other regional and educational organizations.
Each Forum country representative presented a country report of the recent developments in ICT implementation and the problems they faced.
A document summarising these discussions will be drafted for consideration by ministers before their meeting on 30 March.
Autor: PNS
Quelle: Pacific Magazine, 28.03.2006
