ITU, India and UPU Partnership Helps Bhutan Bridge the Digital Divide
The Government of India, in partnership with two UN agencies, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the Universal Postal Union (UPU), will help boost the delivery of e-post services to citizens in the least accessible parts of its south Asian neighbour, Bhutan with a package of equipment, satellite capacity and training resources worth some USD 450,000. The resulting e-post service will allow people without computers in remote areas to send e-mail between post offices for printing and delivery. Click here to learn more about this project. Click here for the press release.

World Summit on the Information Society on Advisory Group Agenda
A preliminary assessment of the conclusions of the Geneva phase of the Summit was provided to TDAG, with emphasis on those outcomes of particular interest to the ITU Development Sector. Analysis of the WSIS Declaration of Principles and Action Plan points to a commonality of views and synergies with the Istanbul Action Plan, the Final Acts of the Marrakech Plenipotentiary Conference and the ITU Strategic Plan. Because of the synergies between the results of the Geneva phase of the Summit and the Istanbul Action Plan, the BDT is actively involved in the implementation of the WSIS Plan of Action. To view some of the actions being implemented in 2004, please click here. To read the press release on TDAG, please click here. To see the summary of conclusions of the 9th meeting of the TDAG, please click here. 

Membership and Partnerships Increase
ITU-D Sector Membership showed a significant increase in membership with 22 new members added in 2003, to reach a record of 282 Sector Members at the end of the year. Among the 22 New Members who joined ITU-D, the Arab and the Asia Pacific regions demonstrated notable growth. Operators and service providers (the majority of 148 Recognized Operating Agencies) and the 60 scientific or industrial or financial organizations, together represent 73% of ITU-D Sector Membership.

Group works to collect good practices for communications in rural areas
Study Group 2 working at the Question of Communications for rural and remote areas has published a form to submit information aimed at collecting the necessary information to develop studies on how ICTs can help to overcome development obstacles in rural areas. The types of projects for this case study should be ongoing or have been recently completed; using technologies specially designed for rural areas of developing countries, including multipurpose community telecentres, tele-medicine, tele-education etc. Also, examples of how equipment has been designed or adapted for use in harsh climatic or geographic conditions of remote and rural areas, such as the use of solar-powered equipment, are of particular interest.  To view the form, please click here.

Work on the migration from circuit-switched networks to packet-switched networks continues
Progress has been made by Study Group 2 to finalize the revision of the draft guidelines for the smooth transition from switched networks to packet-switched networks to be submitted for comments, revision and changes to ITU-T Study Group 13 on Next Generation Networks for their meeting beginning on the 14 June, 2004. This document will be on the website with no revision marks in English for comments as of 7 April. To view the draft work plan leading to the Rapporteur's Group meeting which will take place from the 13 to 16 of September 2004, please click here.

Group publishes a study to assist in resolving telecom disputes and improve dialogue
A co-publication of the International Telecommunication Union and the World Bank called "Dispute Resolution in the Telecommunications Sector: Current Practices and Future Directions" has been published as a contribution to the Global Symposium for Regulators (GSR) and the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), December 2003. The study provides descriptions of how a wide range of disputes have been dealt with and of key issues facing policy makers and regulators. The analysis will contribute to the understanding of telecom dispute resolution and to the dialogue on how to improve it and falls within the framework of Study Group 1. To view the publication, please click here.