A scientist in Buenos Aires gathers remote data about water temperatures, currents and wind in the Pacific Ocean and makes long-term weather forecasts to help people all over Latin America prepare for the potentially devastating El Niño weather phenomenon.

Schoolgirls in Valle de Angeles, Honduras, use local Multipurpose Community Telecentres, built jointly by ITU and the Honduran government, to participate in an e-education programme.

An Indian village in the Canadian outback is connected to the Internet using a solar-powered hybrid wireline/wireless network comprising web access, satellite-enabled videoconferencing and WorldSpace radio. The community is now using the system to set up an online archive to record their language and unique cultural heritage.

Parts of these scenarios already reflect today’s reality; others are still wishful thinking. But with the Americas region now attracting ICT investment from all over the world, these dreams could soon become concrete applications.

The proof, as always, lies in numbers. ITU statistical data indicates that the total number of voice telephony subscribers in the Americas has grown at an astonishing rate. Between 1993-2003, teledensity in Latin America - measured as the number of fixed telephone connections per 100 people - increased by more than 150 per cent. Mobile subscribers have also climbed steadily in recent years to reach 65 million in Brazil alone in 2004, equating to a mobile penetration rate of 36 per cent for the region’s largest nation. Region-wide, for every 100 people, some 43 were connected via either a fixed line or a mobile subscription by end 2004. Yet, large tracts of the population still remain out of reach of a dial tone. Expanding access to benefit all people of the region and all sectors of society is what’s now needed.

The same is true for other regions. While the digital revolution has extended the frontiers of the Information Society, the vast majority of the world’s population remains poorly or entirely unconnected. Recognizing the need to bridge this digital divide, a multi-stakeholder partnership of governments, intergovernmental organizations, civil society and private enterprise was brought together at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).

The first phase of this meeting of world leaders from 175 countries, which took place in Geneva in December 2003, strove to lay the foundations of a truly inclusive Information Society. Significantly, the Summit agreed on the importance of ICTs in addressing many of the major social, political and economic problems facing nations around the world, and the critical role that the free flow of information, ideas and knowledge will play in realizing the development aspirations of people everywhere.

Ensuring connectivity for all has particular importance in the Americas, where regional and even national differences in development levels and standard of living can be very pronounced. ICTs can help bridge these inequities, bringing knowledge, communication and information exchange to people all over the continent. Indeed, nations from throughout Latin America have been extensively involved in negotiations related to the Information Society, beginning with a regional meeting in Bávaro, Dominican Republic, during the Geneva phase of WSIS and culminating in the high level preparatory meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in June 2005.

The ‘Rio Commitment’ adopted at that meeting will help shape the outcome of the second phase of WSIS, to be held in Tunis in November 2005. Here, world leaders will be considering key Information Society issues such as Internet governance and effective financing mechanisms to bridge the digital divide, as well working to define implementation and follow-up measures for the road ahead.

Addressing the international community, Yoshio Utsumi, Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union, the United Nations agency mandated to take the lead role in WSIS, said, “ICTs can connect individuals, small companies or groups of farmers and artisans in the poorest and most isolated areas of the world and empower them with information and knowledge to enhance their socio-economic well-being. ICTs also make it possible to leapfrog poor transport infrastructures so that distance from national, regional, and even global markets is no longer a drawback.”

Efforts to build an equitable infrastructure for the Information Society will spur many new business opportunities for those in the ICT industry, and the Americas region will be no exception. As UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in his opening address to the Geneva Summit, “The future of the IT industry lies not so much in the developed world, where markets are saturated, as in reaching the billions of people in the developing world who remain untouched by the information revolution.”

In acknowledgement of the crucial role the private sector will place in bridging the information gap, the next phase of WSIS will feature much greater involvement of private industry, particularly through initiatives like ITU’s recently launched Connect the World global multi-stakeholder partnership to connect the unconnected. Speaking for the business community at the Geneva Summit, former International Chamber of Commerce Chairman, Richard McCormick, noted that building the Information Society “requires investment, creativity and innovation - all of the things that business does best.” ITU TELECOM AMERICAS 2005 in Salvador de Bahia, Brazil, provides an ideal platform to take up this opportunity and build an equitable - and profitable - Information Society for all.