His Excellency Arc. Namadi SAMBO, Vice-President, Federal Republic of Nigeria represented by the Honourable Omobola JOHNSON, Minister of Communication Technology
Honourable Ministers present
Professor Tim UNWIN, Secretary-General, CTO
Chairman of CTO, Juma KANDIE,
Chairman NCC, Peter IGOH,
Dr Eugene JUWAH, Executive Vice-Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, NCC
Honourable delegates
Dear friends

 

Firstly, on behalf of ITU Secretary-General Hamadoun Touré, and my fellow elected officials, I would like to thank Professor Tim Unwin, CTO’s Secretary General for inviting ITU to speak at this CTO Forum.

 

It is always a great pleasure for me to be in Africa, and as a former member of CTO’s Council, I am especially pleased to be here in Abuja with you this week, so I was delighed when Hamadoun asked me to represent him here, and of course he sends his regards and best wishes.

 

Next to ITU, I believe CTO is the oldest international telecommunication organisation, but even though we have many common objectives, it was not until 2009 that we held our first joint ITU/CTO event – the highly successful NGN Forum in Sri Lanka.

 

I am pleased to say that we have organised quite a few joint events since then, such as the Pacific Broadband Forum in Fiji in 2012, and CTO now as member of all three ITU Sectors, is contributing to many ITU events, most recently the WSIS Forum, and the Global Youth Summit, and is working closely with ITU, especially on broadband roll out.

 

This is a natural alliance and a very valuable one, and we would like to build on the strong foundation we have by exploring other areas for collaboration.

 

For instance, ‘Innovation through broadband’, the theme of this forum, is something that is very much part of ITU’s daily activity.Whether we are buying a book, voting, paying a bill, or coordinating a disaster relief effort, the importance of broadband is well understood.

 

However, if there had not been a set of globally agreed standards that specified, for example, a common means to connect, a common language for exchanging data, and a common format for displaying that data, then the exponential growth in the use of the Internet would probably never have happened.

 

There are many organizations involved and a strong degree of cooperation between them is essential. Ensuring this good collaboration is itself a major challenge.But ITU plays a significant role. Take, for example, your mobile phone: ITU-T codecs provide voice and video; ITU-R defines the radio spectrum and the way in which it is best used; and ITU-D helps countries with various specific projects, their wireless broadband policy, masterplan and roadmap.

 

Mobile backhaul is facilitated primarily by optical transport networks conforming to ITU-T standards, and ITU-R’s IMT Advanced specifications will make your phone at least 100 times faster than today’s 3G smart phones.

 

Many estimates suggest that 95 per cent of international traffic runs over fibre optic cable. This is easy to forget when wireless technology seems so ubiquitous. However, when just one undersea cable is cut, vast areas can suffer loss of service.

 

A very large proportion of the 600 million people that have a fixed broadband connection, are connected via ITU standards, standards that are continually increasing the capacity of both wireless and fixed connections.

 

For example, ITU’s latest copper-based access standard will push aggregate bit rates using traditional copper connections up to an amazing 1 Gb/s.

 

Unfortunately as we know there are those that take advantage of the ease of access and unprecedented speeds facilitated by broadband to harm others, especially the most vulnerable, our children. So we must continue to persue our efforts to improve cybersecurity and in particular to protect children online.

 

In this regard, on behalf of ITU, I thank the First Lady of this great nation of Nigeria, Dame Patience Jonathan, for agreeing to act as ITU’s Champion for Child Online Protection; and the government of Nigeria for agreeing to host the ITU Regional Cybersecurity Centre. I am sure that the ITU partnership with CTO on child online protection will be greatly facilitated by this centre.

 

Keeping up with ITU’s latest standards is therefore crucial in providing interoperability, security, maximizing returns on investments, and meeting the world’s increasing demand for broadband services. I am pleased we have had more than 40 new countries participating in ITU’s standards activities since 2007, countries that had never participated before – many of them African countries.

 

Key stakeholders from right across the Internet and telecoms ecosystem, including public and private sector organizations, technical bodies, academia and civil society, continue to work collaboratively with ITU to ensure coordinated and efficient development of the standards that underpin our interconnected world.

 

I encourage all CTO members, and participants in this forum today, to join ITU in this endeavour, and we look forward to continuing the excellent collaboration that has developed between the two organisations.I wish you an enjoyable and productive forum.

 

Thank you for your attention.