Opening Address
by
Doctor Oktay VURAL
Minister of Transport and Communications of Turkey

Monday, 18 March 2002

Excellencies President Of Turkey,
Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union,
Ministers,
Distinguished Delegates,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

On behalf of the Turkish Government, I would like to welcome to you all to the World Telecommunication Development Conference in Istanbul, the crossroads of civilisations over past centuries as a geographical and cultural bridge between Asia and Europe. Before all, I really want to thank those who spared their valuable time and support for preparation of this significant conference. Especially I would like to thank to the general secretary of ITU for selecting Turkey, for this conference.

It is a widely accepted fact that information technologies, particularly in telecommunications, have been evolving rapidly in recent years. Everyday we are informed a new development or invention in this field. In other words, the accelerating convergence between telecommunications, broadcasting multimedia and information and communication technologies (ICTs) is driving new products and services, as well as ways of conducting business and commerce. These unexpected innovation or changes force us to create a rapid mechanism that will tackle the problems emerging during these process. I hope this conference will be useful in constituting suitable platforms that play an important role in solving the problems.

Today, there is no doubt that the modern world is undergoing an unprecedented transformation as the industrial society that marked the 20th century rapidly gives way to the information society of the 21st century. This dynamic and important process leads to an essential change in all aspects of our lives, including economic and business practices, information dissemination, social and political interaction, media, and entertainment. All humanity is indeed in the midst of a great revolution, probably one of the greatest that human being has ever experienced so far.

With the help of communication technologies, information can be conducted faster and, productivity per person increases, and also a wide range of high quality obtained by using less input.

On the other hand, some countries have high life standards than majority of the world countries. And while some countries develop rapidly, the others develop slowly.

In reality, the technologic improvements are the real source of long term social and individual increase of welfare.

New theoretical approaches and consistent policies can be developed and more realistic economic analysis could be made, through a new value (price) theory based on new technological advances and increased productivity.

No added value and wealth can be produced without an intellectual process; thus " the value is a concept that is beyond the conventional source of the value, such as capital, land and labour.

New economy should have a theory of value and that should declare that the source of all economic values is knowledge vested in all of the production factors, that is productivity.

The acceptance of technological novelty stemming from mental effort as the major reason of welfare of the states brought a new dimension to the classic capital definitions. In the light of these evaluations, it is possible to mention that the most important input which countries raise welfare is " the information needed for production"

However, information needed for production is not enough. A person who will use this information is as valuable as the information itself, sometimes even much more. New information can not be produced if there is not a human with knowledge. Therefore, the human with knowledge, when the technology is based, is the most important source of input of production particularly in developing countries.

In the long run, the source of increase in the welfare of the states is the new technologies and new productive information. In the light that the source of new productive information is the "mental effort" of the humankind, we face with the human beings which have creative mental intelligence, as the most important source, in the long run. Neither the capital nor any other factor can fulfill the role of the "creative mental effort". This is why, the answer is very easy when it is asked as " what is the most important factor for social and individual welfare increase; "HUMAN WITH KNOWLEDGE"

Information and Communication technologies and new economies are at the same time items of information age. These developments lead to a new culture concept. Fundamentally, the essences of cultures are to be justice, balance and equality. In this situation, information is the most important item on the raising of welfare, diversity of services and getting productivity.

The common wisdom forms as a result of the knowledge sharing process, establishes the relations between the societies. Shared knowledge adds more responsibility to the human beings. Thus, the contribution of information age to the formation of common sense would be possible by bridging the digital divide in reaching the knowledge.

Communication technologies facilitate the participation to decision – making process either at institutional or national level. Access to these technologies gained big importance at development of democracy at the view of giving the opportunity of public participation to decisions and of prefer occasions. 

On the other hand, it is possible to create the "well-informed people", that is the most significant factor of development of social and personal welfare, only by sharing of information.

In that respect both the establishment of dynamics of development and the improvement of information age by the help of common sense and socialization of democracy depend on the access and the sharing of information. It is for that reason considering the ‘Bridging the Digital Divide, to provide the fair access to the information, as the main theme of World Telecommunication Development Conference is crucial and suitable for the policies of development.

In order to get equal and maximum benefit from this continued growth of the information technologies, the world community ought to increase their efforts for more global cooperation and harmonization in appropriate areas. Briefly it is a fact that the spread of Information and Communications Technologies, especially the Internet, is revolutionizing whole aspects of social, cultural and economic life. ICTs are creating many new opportunities but, because of their uneven spread, they are also creating new challenges, notably the emergence of digital divides. Therefore, world countries, particularly developed ones should take necessary steps to diminish the increased gap over digital divide issue between them and developing countries.

In this context, I believe that a few more words should be spoken over the digital divide issue. First of all, what is the digital divide? This term widely used to describe increasing differences on information technologies between industrialized and developing countries.

Despite the efforts made by several rich countries and NGOs, it is an undeniable fact that there is a very real danger that the world has been divided into the "information rich" and the "information poor" countries. We are profoundly concerned at the deepening maldistribution of access, resources and opportunities in the information and communication field among the countries and regions.

With great pleasure, we know that the United Nations (UN) and as an specialized body of it, the ITU have been taking a concrete step towards bridging the digital divide between industrialized and developing countries so far. The Information and Communication Task Force (ICT) was launched by UN to facilitate global interconnectivity and spread the benefits of the digital revolution and ITU is going to organize an important summit on Information Society and Digital Divide next year in Geneva. But all of these important steps are not enough to bridge digital divide between developed and developing countries. The U.N together with the ITU and wealth nations, particularly G-8 countries should be more sensitive over these issues and should allocate more money from their budget to lessen digital divide. It is my sincere belief that the World Telecommunication Development Conference in Istanbul, a city which links the two continents, will be a significant milestone in the process of bridging the digital divide, thus contributing to the world's welfare and peace as well.

Today continuing poverty and distress are a deeper and more important cause of international tensions, of the conditions that can produce war. In addition to these, the information and technology gap and related inequities between industrialized and developing nations are widening and these can be another source for creating tension. Thus, in order to reap both the economic and social benefits of technological progress and to improve people's quality of life, the Information Society must be based on the principles of equal opportunities, participation and integration of all. This can only happen if everybody has access to at least a basic set of the new services and applications offered by the Information Society.

Another significant issue needed to talk about it is of course the Internet, being an important part of ICTs, is changing our everyday lives very rapidly. The Internet is no longer just a tool connecting people, businesses, governments and information together. It is driving the creation of new economies that are altering the way people live, learn, work, play and interact with each other. Therefore, a reasonable balance should be set up between advantages and disadvantages of the Internet.

Universal access or service is one of the important and last issue that I want to say a few words on it. The universal service obligation also has its roots in fundamental human rights principles. The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights declared that everyone had the right to freedom of expression and the right to "receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers". Likewise, Article 10 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms recognizes and protects the right to communicate and to access information. To give the rights guaranteed by these articles real meaning, individuals must have some claim to access basic communication and information services. As a member of UN and candidate for EU, Turkey is aware of its commitments and making great efforts to provide quality telecommunication services to its citizens.

The great modernization of the telecommunications structure in Turkey starting from 1980’s is a sign of the evolution of The Information Age in Turkey. The up-to-date digital switching boards and daily expansion of the digital mobile GSM network of Turkey are promising guarantees of Turkey’s ability to prove its competence and skills in the telecommunications sector.

In comparison with the rest of the developing and developed markets of the world, Turkey is a leader in investing in the telecommunications infrastructure per GDP. With 19 million PSTN subscribers and approximately 18 million of GSM subscribers, the telecommunications access paths per one household is 2.6 (260lines/100households) which is one of the highest rates in the world. The telecommunications equipment sector has enjoyed a state priority aimed at modernizing national infrastructure: up to year 2000 a regular annual increase of more than 1 million of lines in PSTN system had been realized. Telecommunications liberalisation is in progress in the sector, which the recently established Turkish Telecommunications Authority has undertaken that subject.

Turkey, with its modern and high capacity infrastructure and also with its satellite, cable TV, cellular systems and internet backbone systems; has become to a respectable position in telecommunications sector as well as its other sectors in the world. In 2000, the number of internet subscribers increased to 2.3 million with a great leap of %609 according to 1999 figures. At present, the number of internet subscribers is about 3 millions which means the connection per household is 22% (22 access paths/100 households).

Now, it is time to take action to give a hand to developing countries to bridging digital divide and also to create more peaceful world. I have great hope that peace and full of cooperation will dominate the forthcoming years. As I conclude my remarks, once again I would like to say welcome all participants. Thank you very much.