Policy and Regulation

There is a Global Symposium for Regulators (GSR) that takes place approximately annually. Since its launch in 2000, the GSRs organized by ITU have provided a unique venue for regulators and policy-makers from both developed and developing countries to meet and exchange views and experiences. The meeting fosters an open dialogue between regulators and key ICT stakeholders: the private sector, investors and consumers.

The themes for past GSRs were:

- 2000: Launching the dialogue among Regulators

- 2001: Effective Regulation

- 2002: Regulating for end-users

- 2003: Promoting Universal Access to ICTs

- 2004: Licensing in an Era of Convergence

- 2005: Regulation in the Broadband World

- 2007: NGN Regulation

- 2008: Six Degrees of Sharing

From the web page for the 9th GSR to be held 10-12 November in Beirut: “The forthcoming 2009 edition will address the challenges of convergence and the changing role of the regulator. At a time of remarkable transformation of the ICT sector, fuelled by a combination of technological, market and regulatory developments, regulators around the world need to ensure that there is free and open competition between all players in the ICT market without favouring one technology over another. In order to address the policy implications which arise from convergence, the GSR09 will broaden the discussion on a variety of related topics such as creating an enabling environment for investment, IP interconnection, consumer protection, regulation of mobile termination rates and VoIP.”

The GSR web pages provide links to a “Best Practices” document from each GSR beginning in 2003 related to the theme of that GSR which provides useful and timely information. For example, the 2003 GSR provided a document on Universal Access Regulatory Best Practice Guidelines. These documents remain relevant despite the rapid changes in telecommunications that have taken place in the last decade.

More detailed study in this area will generally involve working in the specifics of policies and regulations for a given country or region. Information on national regulatory authorities, including web sites, is included in ICT Eye. A country of interest should be selected and then the information available for that country will be displayed.