The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> ALHAGIE MBOW: Good morning, welcome to the Plenary session on the Policy Network and Meaningful Access. This session is entitled eight possible ways to consolidate access that is meaningful. The concept of meaningful access has been involved with the body of evidence that is growing that even when people have connectivity that might not have been fully benefitting from the Internet how one is connected to the Internet and content and services, how it is the experience that the person will have once they're online.
Even more so to the community that they live. Since 2022, the PNMA has been working on the three of the areas. One was connectivity, which is infrastructure, and access.
And business model, the second one digital inclusion through the citizen centric approach. And the third one on capacity development. In 2023, the network expands the analysis and set experiences with implementation of the representation of good practices.
In 2024, the network has contributed to assist and advocate for the implementation of policy solutions for the key issues. And today's session will highlight the meaningful access with focus on the Arab Region and role of meaningful access in the proper set up, use and importance.
Now, we have my co host, that is Giacomo Mazzone. And we also have online Moderator, Judith here. And we have a Rapporteur. And special guest online, that is Vint Cerf.
Now, our speakers this morning, we are going to have Oscar Leon, Syeda Shafaq, and Mohamed Alouini with the corporate engineers and Mr. Martin Schaaper, senior ICT analyst at the International Telecommunication Union. And Mr. Talant Sutanov Chair and co Founder of the Internet Society, Kyrgyzstan chapter.
And Mr. Bobby Bedi content studios LLC. And Ms. Lina Viltrakiene the Ambassador for economic and digital diplomacy from Lithuania.
I will continue. We will hand over to my co host, which is Giacomo to continue. Thank you.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you, I use this opportunity to invite the PNMA members to come in front. We feel alone with you so far from us.
So please, if you can move in front, in the first line, it would be better for us. Just to explain how we were supposed to make it work this session.
The idea is to have two rounds with the speakers here. But some of the speakers asked for more time. So let's say we will have three speakers that will be longer in the first round. And they will be more silent in the second round.
And between the two rounds of speakers, we will have questions from the audience because we want to be more interactive as possible during the session.
So a special thanks to Vint, that is with us from very far. And very early in the morning. Or late in the night, I don't know.
Vint, if you are ready, I will give the floor to you. You have been in the past, the one that mentioned the importance to conjugate properly the access with meaningful.
You are here since the very beginning. I see that also the other speaker, remote, Ms. Syeda Shafaq is with us. Thank you. So Vint, what has changed since the last two years in this field?
>> VINT CERF: Thank you for inviting me to join you this morning. It is it is early in the morning for me, about 1:10. It is earlier than usual. I bring in the leadership panel and thank you for your work. The meaningful policy network work is one of the most important in my work.
After all access that isn't useful can't be meaningful.
And the definition of meaningful access changes over time, it depends on the functionality of the network, and the capacity and capabilities of the system and people that people have access to.
Early days of work, the Internet access is useful. These days it is less so. We do things deliberately at this moment. The definition of meaningful access will change over time. That is why we need to persist in the analysis and evaluation. There are many words that I associate meaningful access, I think of safety and security and the utility. I think of affordability, and providability. The real question is can you measure this. Yesterday I had the opportunity with the UNESCO team. Some of you know they developed something called Internet universality indicators. IUI. They brought this down to a smaller number to make it easier for people to actually do measurement.
It is important for us to find ways to measure what we're doing and how we're achieving meaningful access.
That is one of the reasons that PMA is such an important activity. It is something that is going on during the course of the year. As I said earlier, over the course of time, the metrics for meaningful access have changed, depending on the capabilities of the system.
I'd like to overemphasize the point about accessibility in the sense of accommodating people with various disabilities that might make it difficult for them to make use of the Internet.
I'd like to make and observe at this very moment, I'm making use of an automatic captioning system using an abuse using a browser. We have online sign language interpretation on the screen. I want to thank our host in Saudi Arabia for arranging the accessibility techniques.
it is in the accommodation.
And the last point I would like to make is from the leadership panel is that we have are relaying a message to the United Nations to the Secretary General, and to the Undersecretary of UNDESA, about the World Summit Information Society. This operation is for 19 years before the June meeting in Norway, we will have been around for 20 years.
Our work is not done. Our work continues to be extremely important, and I believe that we should persist, beyond the WSIS+20 timeline. More importantly, I think your work must persist. Among the things that the Internet Governance Forum can do is to continually evaluate Internet intuitivity, and see increase in the policy network and Dynamic Coalition and international and Regional Internet Forums that have popped up almost automatically like mushrooms after a spring rain without benefit of specific UN support, but with evidence of a great deal of interest around the world and utility. I will stop there and thank you for this opportunity to intervene.
For this session of the 2024 IGF.
Have to leave in about 15 minutes, but I will stay here as long as I can before I go to the next meeting. Back to you.
>> ALHAGIE MBOW: Thank you, Vint. Yes, you are quite right our work is not done. We will continuously close this gap. We will move to Professor Mohamed Alouini, a distinguished Professor of professional engineers to tell us, and the Chair on the connect at the University. You can take the floor.
>> MOHAMED ALOUINI: Thank you Giacomo for the invitation and the opportunity to share with the audience some of the work we're doing at the University.
It is a University that is on the West Coast of Saudi Arabia. One hour drive North of the City of Jeddah. My expertise is communication and when we talk about wireless, we talk about beyond 5G and 6G and a lot of the research community is focusing on how to send information at a faster speed. Lower latency. How to intensify the network in the sense in the increase in the number of IoT device.
It is another important aspect that 6G that is expected to be deployed in the early 2030s. It is the Digital Divide we need to mitigate. There was an interesting opening remark from Ms. Doreen, that she reminds us that we still live in a world where one third of the world is unconnected or underconnected. Of course, this is impacted usually least developed countries, it impacts rural areas, low income neighbourhood in developed countries.
We focus on the connected and unconnected. The idea is to develop technologies that can be easier to deploy from accessibility and affordability perspective to bring more people online.
One of the technologies we are pursuing is the network to bring connectivity from the sky.
We had a big event here in Saudi Arabia with Riyadh with collaboration of ITU and the Commission of space and telecommunication technology here in Saudi Arabia. Looking at different approach to connect people Viasat light or high satellite stations.
I want to focus on an example of activities of spectrum sharing techniques. One of the main costs of connectivity is spectrum. And that makes it sustainable from a business perspective. It works well in highly dense, populated environment and kind of area with very good income.
It may sometime make connectivity not affordable in low income neighbourhood or rural areas.
So one of the project that we worked on is a project where we brought connectivity to low income neighbourhood, in terms of a worker camp. It was a project co founded by our University and Meta and was done in collaboration with the Saudi Commission of communication space technologies. And we have a video showing this project. I think that will give you an idea on how analyze spectrum, Wi Fi, optic can be used to connect some of the unconnected. Maybe we can play the video.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Can we have the video, please?
(Video with English subtitles) (No English translation)
>> MOHAMED ALOUINI: Just in conclusion, the same paradigm, one island in the Red Sea. There is many construction site. Some 15, 19 kilomitre away. It is expensive to connect, especially in the section without fiber optic or undersea cables. The same approach, is the spectrum and Wi Fi access point to bring connectivity to the construction site.
I want to mention the strong connection between this kind of work and another very important aspect was highlighted yesterday in resilience. Those of us in a well connected environment, we forget this connectivity can be lost overnight due to request natural disaster. And investing in this technology would allow us to deploy this network on demand when we need it when subject to this kind of disaster.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you Professor. We see here very say strange, but that is not the right word. But unusual cooperation between the University and the area that it operates. It seems interesting, it is that it is a model that can be replicated elsewhere . Very interesting example. Thank you.
Now we move in the Asia Region but move eastern. We move to Pakistan. We have with us Ms. Syeda Shafaq, the Director of the Pakistan telecom in charge of wireless.
The experience you will present us concern gender, because of course, there is a problem with gender. We have seen yesterday the statistics provided by the host country about the gender gap in the Internet.
You are trying to make something concrete in your country. Can you explain how we are doing it in maximum seven minutes, if possible. Thank you very much.
>> SYEDA SHAFAQ: Thank you to the team. Yes, in Pakistan, as we have already explained, you have more issues. And Pakistan is located in one of the most important socioeconomic Region of South Asia. In Pakistan, we are having huge population of 250 million and reaching 200 million because we stand at 196 million mobile users in the country.
So out of this population of 250 million, we are, the women are making 50% of the total population.
When it comes to the numbers of mobile usage, they receive a huge gap, which is being explained through the slides, if I am allowed to share my screen, I will present you quickly through the digital gender interior strategy. It is one of the most implemented kind of strategy for working on the gender gap and the Authority has taken all of the public and private stakeholders together and collaborate with each other to truly reduce the gap and create a difference in this regard. I will be sharing my screen. And getting it over in seven minutes, hopefully. So here we. I will quickly take you through the gender inclusion strategy with the health development to tackle this very critical aspect of the telecommunication connectivity which is equally important for men and women of the society to make a society digital as a whole. For this approach, to see some of the legislative environment that is already in place in Pakistan, but as you can see, starting from the constitution of Pakistan and moving towards the 2030 Agenda, all of them are highlighting and creating an enabling environment for women.
And with the recent Pakistan East framework, we can see that in the Pakistan environment, we see that equity and empowerment is one of the Government's focus area where we need to work together to make our women to play a role in digitalization of the country as a whole.
For improvement of the socioeconomic Sector of the country. So when we talk about the digital gender gap in Pakistan, we see we are improving, in 2022 2024. And see here the gap was 20% in 2018, which is reduced to 2% in 2024.
That means that awareness is created through some of the strategic steps taken by all of the stakeholders and initiated by the Government Sector. If we talk in terms of mobile ownership, we see a huge gap. That is actually because of the socio status of the country. Where we see males are usually taking over the responsibility of all the females to have mobile and ownership. To talk about the Internet users, there is a gap of 38% which is a huge gap. And we all are looking forward to reduce this gap as early as possible to allow the women of the country to play their roles for the digitalization of the country.
Talk in terms of the social media usage, there are huge numbers we're working together to improve this number. So if we talk in terms of the coverage gap, we can see certain studies from GSMA where coverage gap is replaced by usage gap most areas have broadband coverage. Part of the people are not using it for their benefit and for their usage on the Internet in a meaningful manner.
So if we see that around 38% of the Global population that live in the footprint much the mobile broadband network but are not using it.
So here, 28% of the Global population is usually a part of the Global population which is female based which is women. So to tackle this whole issue, PTA has taken lead for the digital gender inclusion initiative, and we have identified the challenges to bridge the Digital Divide and formulate a public plan with specific actionable items, Agenda mainstreaming. We decided to liaison with Partner organisations to implement joint projects in the gender divide.
So we have a hashtag, the name of Her Digital Pakistan, as we are all moving toward digitalization of the country. Yesterday, there was a bill passed in the country. The Her Digital Pakistan will focus on the female participation for purposing.
As we collaborated with various stakeholders and there was the affordable Internet. And we had to react in a manner with the rights, education, access, content and target to meet for reducing the gender gap.
And then we decided to collaborate and identify some of the areas with the existing telecom operators, where we have the PTCL and companies, China mobile company and Telenor, and SCO. And we joined in the digital scale and awareness campaigns, and education, some disability inclusion as well for reducing and including them for users of telecom. And for gender inclusion at the company level. Online safety and security, campaigns were one of the main Agenda. And some digitalization for females and enhancing the females for usage.
So internationally we collaborated with some international organisations and became a Partner with International Telecommunication Union by pledging with the partners to connect for the digital gender inclusion strategy development, which being delivered to ITU in the last working year. It was implementation that was already started. Then there is an association as partners and we developed, our mobile Internet skills, in our national language, Urdu, that is being used to disseminate to females in the area of the country.
And we have affordable Internet as the process for including everybody around. And different Government and Private Sector. And UNESCO was definitely the strategy building Partner.
It supported us technically and financially for development of the strategy. And I'm sure that here is a website shown for you. This is the telecom regulator website. On the right page, you will find a link for gender inclusion in ICT. And there are certain aspects and strategies that are available. There is a video clip to play and see about the initiatives and international collaborations. And different press releases to educate some of the Regional countries who can also get some experience from our lessons. And they can also follow the same for their benefit.
Then for the women we follow the team and create different awareness campaigns and social media, and electronic media as well. The digital gender inclusion strategy, the best part is that we connect with all of the public and private stakeholders and we have brought the technical advisory bodies that are working internationally, they're making a positive impact for those like us that are struggled to fight the gender gap. The key pillars are affordable, improve digital skills, creating awareness, safety and security, and access and gender disaggregated data. And because all of the reports are based on gender disaggregated data, which is a challenge from the supply and demand side.
Understanding local context is important in creating this strategy. To integrate the gender perspective and policy initiatives. And address key barriers and final approach is collaboration with stakeholders, we believe without it, we cannot manage a comprehensive holistic approach.
To create the strategy, we adopted many themes like public perception survey. Created IVR survey. And have the GSMA consumer survey. And multistakeholder workshops for interviews and all of the details are on the website to have a look. And get further details and insights.
And online business work.
After the survey and development, we see that there are certain barriers and challenges. One of the most important is the fear of the unknown. Safety and security concerns, with the female use of Internet. Some of the main members of the society is women interest, the same to use Internet and it would be some harmful for them. There is positive awareness and perception about use of Internet. And device and service affordability and gender disaggregated data and digital literacy and local content. Infrastructure and access. And controls in the family that women were not allowed to make use of the Internet and mobile services for their meaningful access.
And lack of stakeholder collaboration. That was also one of the biggest challenges and barriers that was identified after the data collection.
In this instruction, we have developed a Pakistan digital gender inclusion Forum. It is a three year Action Plan, there is work in six Working Groups, on research and data collection. On affordability. Working Group on access for women and security and safety. And a Working Group on women's digital literacy and inclusion. And they're lead by the leading public organisations and supported by the private organisations, and technical advisory bodies.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you.
>> SYEDA SHAFAQ: I'm aware of the lack of time. And the conclusions, and the areas of collaboration. For connectivity, we need to look at collaboration areas to go together with the Private Sector and other bodies to make a positive and meaningful impact for the women to play their role. Thank you very much. You can find this strategy on the PK website.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you.
>> SYEDA SHAFAQ: I will stop sharing my screen.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you.
>> SYEDA SHAFAQ: I'm sorry. I tried to wrap it up quickly.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: We will propose you for the marathon at the Olympics, the marathon in slide readings. Thank you Ms. Syeda Shafaq for.
>> Alhagie Mbow: Thank you for the work you are doing, particularly in the areas of closing the gap with Agenda. We will move to Mr. Martin Schaaper ICT analyst and data in the analytics division.
That is at the ITU. Thank you for the work that the ITU is doing across the globe. You are welcome Mr. Martin Schaaper.
>> MARTIN SCHAAPER: Very much, good morning, thank you for having me. It is a real pleasure. I have slides that should be coming on, maybe.
>> ALHAGIE MBOW: Can we get the slides for Mr. Martins.
>> MARTIN SCHAAPER: Last year at IGF we spoke about a protect we started before on measuring meaningful connectivity. It really came into full swing this year. I'm going to give you an update of that project.
So ah, a bit of a problem because I cannot see my slides. Next slide, please. They're not on ...
Can they project it on the Zoom as well? And can I have the next slide, please? Ah.
Okay. That's fine. Thank you.
So we define universal and meaningful connectivity, the possibility for everyone to enjoy a safe, satisfying, enriching productive online experience at an affordable cost.
Meaningful is not just what you do with it, but that you can use it whenever you want to for a reasonable price. We already heard the importance of data. That is the core of the product, bringing data to policymakers and other way around. Evidence is really crucial in all of this. At ITU is measuring basically ever since the existence of ITU is important 150 years ago. We have long tradition of data and a lot of data. I will show you a few data from the publication facts and figures that came out less than a month ago.
Now on Zoom again. So it was mentioned by the opening session, 5.5 million online. But 2.6 are not using the Internet yet. But one third of the population.
If you look at this Region, in the Arab state, it is a little bit around the Global effort, 70% of people are using. 30% are not. The real gap, as you can see here is in Africa, where only 38% of the population is online.
Most other Regions, except for Asia, we're approaching already universal usage. Especially Europe and Americas.
Now we also this morning already came um a little bit the difference between the Conference cap and usage cap, the Conference cap is people not being able to even connect to a mobile network. Here, we see it. They're gone on the Zoom, so I have to turn around. We can see that especially in the high income country, 85%. And low income countries, not many 5G and many don't have 4G and a large percentage don't have any network at all. There is a large gap in the low income countries, as we heard as well.
Affordability is also an important barrier for people to go online. If the infrastructure is there, you need to spend some part of your monthly income to get a signal. And we can see that mobile is affordable in most Regions of the world, being less than a percent or less than 2% of someone's monthly income. Except in Africa it is 4%. Fixed broadband on the other end, with a signal in some Regions of the world is completely unaffordable. 13% of income to spend on broadband that may not be good is a lot of money. There is more on the gaps, age gap, traffic, and a lot of other data in our publications, I really encourage you to go there.
How do we bring this to the policymakers? Data is crucial. Policymakers need the make and they need to inform us as to the data we need.
To promote and measure universal and meaningful connectivity, we have funding from the EU, 3 million Euro Global project for three years, to work for measurable and meaningful connectivity. It was started in the first of May.
When we hired everyone to put it in place, it was a few months later.
In 2024, we have undertaken a lot of work. There are four work streams leading to four outputs and eventually impact. Advocacy work stream leading to increased awareness of the whole concept
Data collection and dissemination that is what we do at the ITU, the bread and butter.
The capacity building to enhance the statistical capacity and also the awareness to measure UMC.
And research, but eventually should lead to better policies to UMC achievement.
On the advocacy part I'm doing at the moment, to spread the word. Spread the word. Go to all kind of events, inside the UN, outside of the UN. We have our own World Telecommunication symposium. G20, and lots of other events.
UMC is already mentioned in the UN Digital Global Compact. It is taken up by the G20, there are guidelines for measuring UMC. And we are active on social media, et cetera.
Data collection and dissemination this is the heart of the work we're doing. That is also our strength.
We developed a set of targets that are part of the UN Secretary General Roadmap for cooperation.
We have our own website and we now have a dashboard where we have data on the targets for all countries in the world to compare where your country is or how countries are doing compared with the other or how indicators are doing compared with other indicators, et cetera.
We have an online course on the selection and use of UMC indicators, this is also capacity building part. Manual and price data and starting big data to support UMC measurements.
The capacity building part, which is also an important part of the project, we're basically going to all the Regions in the world, Region by Region and we bring together the users and producers of the statistics from each of the countries of the Region. So at the end of the workshop, there is a sort of understanding of the concept of UMC. Greater awareness of the critical role of data and policymaker and the availability to advocate for investment in data infrastructure and capabilities, eventually leading to improved capacity to produce reliable data on UMC which are then used in the policy process of the countries.
We had workshops already in the Caribbean, the Arab States and in the CS and in Bangkok, and next year in Francophone, Latin America and more.
And finally, research in 2022, we had the Global connectivity report.
In the framework of the project, we will do another report every year for the next three years. So the next report will be planning to bring it out probably somewhere in the second or third quarter of 2025. Then also some smaller Regional and thematic analysis.
Really, this was in a nutshell the project and data. There is a wealth more. There is two links there on the slides, if you just Google ITU data, you get on the website and you can find everything.
So with that, I hand back to the Moderator. I thank you for your attention.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you, Martin. I remember, for everybody that this project is already in our repository on the website. And will be updated. You will find all of this information as Vint was mentioning at the beginning, measuring is essential if you want to be sure to do the right thing.
We have another set of tools that can help in this. The next experience will be about Latin America. We will shift from continent to another.
And we have a video of Mr. Oscar Leon, that is the Secretary General of CITEL the telecommunication organisation. Can I ask the control room to send the video, please. Can we have the video, Mr. Leon from CITEL. And then okay. We will do it because we are late, and we will do our best.
>> Oscar Leon: With CITEL. We are focused on this initiative as a Global Best Practices in using this to empower the underserved areas, the initiative on policy reforms in working in telecommunication communications and CITEL has bridged the Digital Divide in Latin America and Caribbean, guided by 21 impactful guidelines, things that are tailored and diagnostics and strategic Roadmaps to ensure implementation.
By optimizing universal service points, fostering public private partnerships, in the regulation and adopting the logistics CITEL enhanced access to the Internet and essential services.
In the socioeconomic and (?) progress. This effort showcase the example of impactful and is deserving recognition.
Give me a moment, I want to share my screen to show you some details.
The details in the equalities that are exacerbated by outdated and inefficient regulatory policies, limits the economic, social and development of the Region. The inequities of the key areas such as employment. This is compounded by the issues such as high Internet cost, lack of political interests, the digital skills and deficient infrastructure. Which is the implementation of the new issues and connected areas that are needing Digital Transformation.
These 21 guidelines serve as blueprint for progress encompassing diagnostics of the development of the Roadmaps which
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with the digital gap, to foresee the development. The technical support provided by the Secretary in Colombia are now in Bolivia has seen significant progress into the reform and regulations, to measure the importance of solutions that is integrate digital confirmation projects as well as the promotion of the inclusive
Have been promoted to the del vision and well being. It is the quality of the communication services.
The actions taken have the risk areas. Connecting communities to self sustaining systems.
Which produces the Digital Divide in the Americas. Because it decrease for the cultural creation and access to the community networks, promoted technological adoption with access to basic services.
Additionally, public private investment in telecommunication has been improving quality of life, economic, social and access to essential services. Such as health and integration.
To connecting disconnected areas has provided technical support to focus on the implementation of affected public policies and regulatory reforms. It has been essential to have multisectoral among Governments, private companies, NGOs and local communities. Developing sustainable business models and creating flexible public policies that attract investment in telecommunications. Additionally, it has required a Governmental commitment to modernize legal framework and make the investment in infrastructure to drive inclusive and sustainable digital transformations.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Okay. Thank you very much for this contribution. You see we move to the Regional scale, the problems are different. But also the solutions are different and can be possible. We have a concrete example there.
We make a change of schedule because we are running late.
So I will give immediately the floor to our two remote Moderators. Roberto and Judith.
Can you tell us if there are questions from remote before going to the room? In the meantime, I ask people in the room that want to intervene to go to the podium there to give them the floor, if any. Thank you. Judith? Roberto?
>> JUDITH: Hello? Yes, we don't necessarily have questions in the room, but there is one question we had here is that people were asking about corruption and is there let me get the question. Hold on a minute.
They wanted to know about ... hold on. Yeah. What is the impact? Because as we have the digitalization, we have a reduction in corruption issues. And wanted to ask some questions about that because they wanted to see how that is factored into the discussions that we're having.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Okay. Thank you. I don't see people in the room moving to the podium. So we can start we cannot see very well because we have the light just in front of us. But okay.
So I think we can start?
>> ROBERTO: We have time. If there are two podiums.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: We can start to answer this question. I think this is a question for Ms. Syeda Shafaq. In your experience as a regulator, the factor of digital is improved, to reduce the corruption, that is being useful? Transparency and procedures and digitalization? Thank you. Please.
>> SYEDA SHAFAQ: Thank you for this question, regarding the corruption aspect. We in Pakistan, we have obviously seen definite change in terms of the digitalization in relation to the corruption issue because as soon as the processes go online, there is very less room for making any manipulations or any kind of things which could be more unclear and untransparent.
And actually, if I talk about one of the digital systems that Pakistan has recently introduced is the public procurement system, through which we buy everything online, whether it is procurement of services, whether it is the procurement of goods.
So all of the services which are brought online, they have to pass through certain procedures through an automated system, which is as far as electronic reinforcement and disposal system.
Through this system, all of the things are streamlined and automated. Nobody can make any changes in between. So we believe that making things automated are creating an online system. And it expedites the process and adds transparency. And it can lead to a reduction of the corruption processes which are no doubt there in every country.
So this is all we have as a regulator. We have developed online systems for procurement for selling and issuance of licenses and there are processes that are also automated in the country.
This makes the process more efficient. There are computed in a timely manner and they have become more transparent and aware with the application status and apart from that, in the future, Pakistan is working on the right to the automation system also. That will be creating a one stop shop for the people who want to have right away the telecommunication structure.
That will reduce the issues. And the automation and digitalization is definitely catalyst for reducing corruption. This is how we think about it as a regulator.
>> JUDITH: Thank you so much. We do have one other question. This is from Omar. He said considering the increasing use for biometric data for online verification, how can we secure the privacy of young people's sensitive information especially in countries with limited data protection laws, and what role does international policy frameworks play in setting Global standards?
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Okay. We have a question from the floor, please?
>> ATTENDEE: Can you hear me?
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: You can go.
>> ATTENDEE: I'm from ICTP Italy. I have a question about if you are actually collecting any metrics about the let's say starting constellation, in the provider that are provided with the satellite.
What I am seeing is more and more people, especially in remote areas are depending on the constellation with Starling. What concerns me is there is so many population relying on one commercial company, that will basically be providing the Internet. If they decide to raise the price and not affordable, what is the effect.
Especially as Government might lose the interest in building local infrastructure due to the very good and fast Internet services. Thank you.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you very much. I think the question is addressed to everybody, but specifically to Government representative.
Do you think that the only experience I bring in the spot, Ms. Lina Viltrakiene from Lithuania, you represent the Government. You are dealing with these two issues?
>> LINA VILTRAKIENE: Yes. Thank you very much for the questions. From the Government perspective, we have to take a really active role in providing both connectivity but also meaningful access in terms of skills, in terms of Programmes, in terms of standards.
From the Lithuanian Government perspective, I have to say that in terms of physical infrastructure or connectivity, we really lay down a very strong Foundation for digital inclusion.
We have developed fiber broadband Internet which reaches 90% of households and 95% of population has access already to 5G for. For the remote area we used mobile Internet solution, which really helps to connect people where fiber broadband could be difficult.
However, coming back to standards and coming back to real challenges for meaningful access, I have to say that real challenge is equipping all citizens and particularly vulnerable Groups with skills and confidence to navigate the digital world.
And here we apply a number of measures, I don't know if I have another chance to talk about elderly people.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: When we finish the question. I think that still we have another question, maybe, please?
>> ATTENDEE: Thank you very much for giving me the floor. My name is Mary U. I'm from Nigeria. I belong to a Group that is passionate about meaningful and community networks.
We realize that in most countries sometimes the universal access fund is being collected, millions of dollars had been collected.
I don't know where there is an example a use case example or experience on how to deploy this or activate these funds accumulated to be able to provide connectivity to the rural and the underserved.
That is one bit. The second bit is, which strategy works? Is it the commercial strategy of connecting the unconnected? Or the social strategy of connecting the unconnected?
I would like any of you to share with us what has happened in your own environment. Because our community needs digital justice.
If we are to provide digital justice for our people, we should look at all the commercial strategy that will work, but the CITEL use I think CITEL, the last person that the video. They were talking about private public private partnership.
Is it working better? Or do we look at the social strategy? Thank you.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you, Mary. Can I ask Alhagie Mbow as co Moderator and member of the African Parliament, the problem we mention by the last two person that intervene from the floor are your daily bread. The African Parliament, how do you deal with that.
>> ALHAGIE MBOW: Thank you. You are right Madam. In fact, countries in Africa that are collecting universal access fund, but it is still not able to provide the low income and also to the privilege.
However, there are also countries that are using it for example, for community networks, in Tanzania. We have good examples of community networks.
Now, the other question deals with the first person that asked the question about competition, for example.
You realize in most African countries now, Governments are moving away from privately owning telecom companies. Now they open up to the Private Sector, which means for example, if you go to the Gambia one of the smallest countries in Africa, you have four or five different telecommunication companies, and the Government has more. If you look at the broadband provided, the majority is controlled by the Private Sector.
I think this trend is seen in Nigeria, it is seen in Ghana and South Africa.
Government is controlling less the telecom Sector, but the Private Sector is coming in more and more.
I think that is quite good in the sense it is going to create competition and also going to ensure the prices actually are not hogged by only one company. So the more companies you have, the better the competition. I think the trend going on now in Africa is that the Private Sector are getting more and more into the telecommunication Sector in the provision of broadband around the continent.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Another question from the floor? And then we close because we have the other speakers.
>> ATTENDEE: Hello. Appreciate your efforts and wish you all success.
It is not a question, it is a suggestion. I'm Dr. Nora saline, the Secretary General of the Arab consultation status. As expert in intellectual property, I suggest to include the intellectual property in the Global measurement taken to include all in the digital environment. And we are an organisation concerned with intellectual property.
We have launched as the platform to protect intellectual property in the digital era.
So I hope to include this idea in the Global measurement. Thank you.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you very much for this contribution. Yes, we count on your written contribution that will be included in the final report of the policy network. Thank you very much.
So we have to be very short, unfortunately. So Talant Sutanov, can you bring one of the experience that could be interesting answering also to the question we have listened to now. Thank you.
>> TALANT SUTANOV: Thank you, Giacomo. I'm wearing my new hat of the Global education partnership. I'm really happy that the organisation GDAP has participated in actively in the working for the Pakistan gender digital transformation strategy.
GDIP is currently working on an initiative called women on economy fund on closing the gender gap. I am happy yesterday the Plenary all the speakers highlighted the importance of this issue.
One of the core areas for closing the gender digital divide and Digital Divide in general is access to relevant tools and products and content.
I want to bring one example of how we are providing access to whether tools, climate monitoring tools and data for rural communities, using IoT and technologies in Central Asia.
To give you brief background, I come from Kyrgyzstan. It is the largest warm front reserve outside of North and South Poles.
If you look at the statistics, tracing since the 1950s, the biggest climate change is happening in Central Asia. What that means is the glaciers, that are storing all of the fresh water are melting rapidly. This water feeds a quarter of the global population. At the same time, together with water shortage, there are increasing number of disasters happening.
To be able to monitor and help populations, especially in the rural areas to be better prepared for disaster risks, we launch this project, together with ISOC Foundation and Internet Society ChatGPT and ICPT to monitor climate using new technologies.
Today in Kyrgyzstan there is only population of 80 million. That in the rural communities, it is not strong and communities may not be aware of potential disasters in the area. This project that uses IoT, Internet of Things, sensors, and technology, communication technology that can send data to hundreds of kilometers if you have a clear line of sight can help improve the situation, using the technology, install the sensors high in the mountains to monitor glaciers or mountain lakes, install them in flat areas, under the ground to monitor temperature of the soil. And moisture.
You can put them in the water. Many uses and we have been testing this technology in Central Asia and we are really happy that this technology has proven to be viable. We tested them with ordinary stations to see if it correlates with the big weather stations and it actually does.
Plus you have more uses for these sensors not just for climate monitoring, agriculture and wildlife. And a colleague in Finland is using this to monitor deers.
This brings me to conclusion of my presentation, next steps. We would like to monitor wildlife. In Central Asia, we have snow leopard. We would like to use for that. And for the reindeer, you know holidays are coming up. Santa Claus, if we believe in Santa should be able to deliver toys to children. Scientist from Sweden said Santa should be located in Kyrgyzstan to deliver gifts to all the children in the world. A mountain peak from which it is the longest sight into the world. 550 kilomitres into a mountain in China. Last year we discuss with Professors at ICTP, to establish a link between the two peaks and see if science and the technologies are indeed possible to connect these kind of locations.
These are some of the next steps for our project. Other applications that we are planning to do is using all of the data, the weather stations collect and apply machine learning. There is concept called tiny machine learning, to help us monitor and potentially forecast disaster risk. This is quickly very briefly about this project. I would be happy to explain more later on. Thank you.
>> ALHAGIE MBOW: Thank you, very much. And we move to Lina Viltrakiene, with the economic digital diplomacy for Foreign Affairs in Lithuania.
>> LINA VILTRAKIENE: We talked about the local of bridging digital gaps. I want to focus on the digital skills for the elderly. How to ensure digital inclusion of the elderly people.
Here, the Government has to allocate some from Lithuania experience, I share that the Government has to allocate specific resources for this purpose. In our case, we recently just invested 2 million Euros for specifically to improve the digital skills of socially vulnerable Groups and in particular elderly people and residents of remote residential areas.
The Government has to set clear tasks, clear targets.
For example, in Lithuania, by 2030 we aim to equip 80% of adults to perform everyday digital tasks. By the same year, we provide 100 of key public services online in a Public Sector.
So with these ambitious tasks, indeed the Governments alone cannot achieve them. So we need to involve all the society. We need to involve other public institutions, academic institutions. Private Sector. Civil Society. And I would like to share with you one example from Lithuania. We have such initiative called no one left behind.
Which was launched more than a year ago by the communications regulatory Authority of Lithuania. It particularly focuses on improving digital skills among seniors.
And while as I'm lacking time, I will be brief just presenting that with this initiative, we managed to grow a very robust public and private partnership, that answers the question that was raised from the floor, in our case, it involves more than 140 collaborators, including state authorities, Private Sector, municipalities, media, and others.
And we call this initiative now, all Lithuania's project. The main results of the project are that during one year, seminars were held at 18, third age Universities.
Remote seminars reaching rural areas through digital platforms like senior worlds or Zoom.
We established partnerships with 33 municipalities, were supported by providing facilities to the elderly people. The initiative trained 3500 seniors and one and a half thousand schoolchildren, addressing different issues, including like cyber threats and fraud prevention.
That is important, because that also build confidence of the people on digital world. And well 40 municipalities involved broadcasters, so on, so on.
Further on, next year, we plan to expand this project, and also train other vulnerable Groups, such as jobless and socially isolated people. Well, perhaps as a last remark is that I would like to mention that it's very important for all the projects, for all the stakeholders involved in bridging the gaps to be close to those with whom you are working.
So be as close as possible, be it libraries in the case of Lithuania. Be it postal offices. In the case of Kenya, where we have a project of our company working on providing trainings and skills to elderly people there.
Be it banks, like in Estonia, or any other places, community hubs, which are very close to those in need.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you very much. It is interesting to see what you say is very near to what Mary from Nigeria was saying. We need to build through communities.
In order to reach the communities, our last speaker is Bobby Bedi. There is a question of identity. Identity, cultural identity. You can build the communities, keep the communities around their identities.
And audio visual media is an important way to build the identity fields, feelings. What is your experience? What are you doing in this?
>> BOBBY BEDI: Thank you very much. I think being the last person to speak gives you the chance of being the interceptor.
I was going to show you beautiful pictures of the work I'm doing in the Region, given the time it is better to say what I have to say.
The main thing is discussing meaningful policy and network access. The most meaningful is an adjective, access is the main word and the reason that we have accessed.
It is expert.
The reason for the existence of the Internet is of the interested desire of humanity to engage and entertain. I don't mean entertainment in terms of dancing and singing. It is in the interdriving of 1015 and papers, entertainment. I'm in the business of telling stories. I think the Internet exists because people like to tell stories and listen to stories. That is why we tell stories. We will engage in entertainment. So for me, the four words follow in that order. Engage, entertain, in a form, educate.
It is very difficult to just jump to the last. That is a process. That is why the guard outside of my house, that is why the child working with my working help, my friends, everybody has Internet. It is because of those reasons.
Now that we have it, what can we do with it.
That is the first part of the word, which is meaningful.
There I can tell you that in India, where we have 1 billion almost a billion people with Internet access, it is a percentage still not the largest in the world or anything. A billion people is a billion people. That is connections.
Half of them are urban. Half of them are rural. All of them access the Internet. Most of them do it through a smartphone.
And all of them use it to engage and entertain. But in this process, what has happened is whether it is crop prices or market or weather conditions, whether it is health, or COVID regulation, all of it is the benefit that you are getting.
Just recently, the area had a huge air pollution problem. Every single school shifted to doing classes those children doing classes on the phone.
And you know what? It is working. It was something new had happened. They were actually sitting in their uniforms, in their rooms and actually attending class.
So for me, it is very important to keep focusing on this aspect of engagement and people meeting and talking to each other. And all of the agencies and the Government and all of them take advantage and are able to make it more meaningful in many ways.
There again, I think that even that is meaningful. Even the emotional support that it gives you, even the social support that it gives you makes it meaningful.
It is not just medical meaningfulness or anything. All of these things are meaningful.
Now, I will just come to the last bit.
Which is what I am doing in this Region. Especially the country that we're in, Saudi Arabia, entertainment is in reality two years old.
It starts five or six years ago with the opening up of entertainment. But then COVID came and et cetera. It is really two to three years old. It is already in terms of cinemas, this is 60% of the Arab box office. That was the hunger you saw.
Now, here, what we're doing is we're creating and trying to create a major time gap. Bringing fables, mystical stories, bringing in Shakespeare, relocating it in situations where it is relevant in Jeddah, like setting Macbeth in a Jeddah story, et cetera. You create them together, and if they engage, you use the connection to educate, to inform, to improve health, improve mental balance, all of that.
That is a relationship we need to nurture and keep between the entertainment and the meaningfulness of it. So I think really, the last thing is that for the Internet to be meaningful, it needs to all encompass and needs to engage first and entertain first. It will inform and educate. Lastly, also, let's not forget the role of advertising, which none of us really like. But it is funding the process and makes a lot of what we are trying to do possible.
Thank you.
>> GIACOMO MAZZONE: Thank you, Bobby, we have to go to a close. Alhagie Mbow?
>> ALHAGIE MBOW: Thank you for the wonderful conversation. We have really run out of time. I suggest to my co facilitator, give 30 seconds each to see what we need to do generally. To be very important in public University, working with the private to provide. We want to give you each 30 seconds to give us in very clear and straightforward time, what do we need to do to close the gap and shrink it so the underprivileged can be connected?
>> MOHAMED ALOUINI: I think from my perspective and hearing all that is said during this panel, clearly there is an opportunity to establish strong collaboration between private for investment and managing this project, Public Sector to facilitate regulation, Academia, Universities to bring innovation and research and try to make the technology more affordable and more accessible.
>> MARTIN SCHAAPER: Data is critical and crucial especially on socioeconomic background, unfortunately we don't have enough data, so it is very important that countries around the world invest in data capabilities.
If you want to say 30 seconds, if not, we will go to a close, because we are already late. So thank you very much for being with us. You have listened to eight different models to make meaningful the access from the entertainment to talking with the families, to reaching to the elders, to protect life through early warning system through the University cooperation with the territory and through statistical measures in order to know what exactly to do. I thank you everybody for being with us so patient. And sorry for the next session that we are taking time to them. But I think that was a passionate travel around the globe to understand how we can better behave for the future. Thank you very much.
>> ALHAGIE MBOW: Thank you, we want to thank our consultant on this important Programme. He worked day and night to put it together and put all the documentations. We want to thank you very much. And thank the audience as well as our co facilitators. Thank you very much. Thank you.