Statement
by
Mr. Shazada Alam Malik
Chairman, Pakistan Telecom Authority & Head of Delegation 
Islamic Republic of Pakistan

Monday,18 March 2002

Thank you Mr. Chairman, for providing me this opportunity to share my views with this august gathering of telecommunication professionals. Mr. Chairman, first of all I like to congratulate you on your election as chairperson and for conducting the Conference so well. I also like to thank secretary general ITU and the Government of the Republic of Turkey for hosting this international event of World telecom Development Conference (WTDC-2) in the historic city of Istanbul.

Mr. Chairman, I would try to be very brief, as we have already submitted our paper on bridging the digital divide, which you have very kindly circulated amongst the delegates.

I am not going to read out my paper rather I will confine to sharing some of our perceptions with the delegates of the Conference. Analysing the problem from our point of view I will also submit some recommendations for consideration of the conference.

Mr. Chairman, Economy of today is driven by the power of telecommunication infrastructure and information and not by the conventional resources of Electricity and Steal as in the past. We are quite aware of the risk of the digital divide and we feel that perhaps we are not coming out of our predicament as we have not been able to put our priorities right.

I like to acknowledge that ITU has done appreciable work in providing required technical assistance to Least Developed Countries (LDCs); but we feel that developing countries like ours where tele-density is still low (less than 3 %); The IT has not permeated across the country. We are also at relative disadvantage and confronted with challenges of digital divide. In our case ICT penetration is far below the satisfactory level. We need to do much more to bridge such increasing gap. We need to be helped and guided as to how to become partner in the Global ICT revolution. ITU should also come out with strategies and action plans that may help such developing countries, like ours.

For the Government of developing countries, this problem is more pronounced as our resources are limited. Out of scarce funds we have to address other pressing priorities like Food, shelter, health, clean water, sanitation, roads, railways etc. We are seriously constrained with the question as to how to allocate judicially out of meager resources for ICT development

Digital Divide cannot be filled from our conventional methods rather we feel that the gap will continue to increase. Thousands of settlements and rural communities in Pakistan virtually have very little or no telecom facility and therefore there is no question of any Internet service. I also understand that this is not the mandate of ITU. However I am of the view that ITU can play effective role through policy process and can partner its efforts with multi-lateral bodies like UNDP, World Bank, Asian Development Bank and similar organizations for implementing coordinated action plans. Unless something is done in a big way the situation is not likely to change.

On our part we have taken number of initiatives to expand telecom service. Infrastructure, and Internet and we have been able to extend the access from twenty-nine cities (August 2000) to over 570 cities in 2002. Pakistan has also reduced domestic and international bandwidth rates to just 15% of what they were two years before. Similarly International and domestic long-distance voice tariffs have been substantially reduced. We are trying to bring telecommunication and Internet tariffs within people’s affordability limits. Since the per capita GDP is low hence people cannot afford to pay high tariff. Other initiatives taken in Pakistan are as under: -

• Substantial policy incentives are in place

• Efforts are on way for allocating the resources

• Regulatory fees have been reduced substantially in several cases and in others, effort is under way

• Regulatory body is fairly independent

• Telecom Monopoly is being terminated in 2002 and

• Sector is being opened and liberalized for competition and new incentives are being offered to the investors

In the end I like to conclude that Digital Divide in essence is the divide of economy or resources. There is need for immediate attention for the world community and ITU to help remove imbalances caused by the digital divide. There is need to overcome serious social and economic problems faced by the developing world. In my view there is need to ponder over this dilemma by G-8 countries and World Bank to focus on the third world countries to help removing the gap. ITU should focus on standards, which ensure availability of low cost technologies. ITU may start evolving policies for attracting investment in telecom sector for cheap and effective telecom infrastructure

To overcome knowledge-divide sharing of knowledge and Human resource Development through Technical assistance program are worthwhile to consider. There is need to upgrade training and technical institutes in developing countries. ITU has been under-taking such programs in the past and this should be re-vitalized in the face of changing ICT scenario.

In the end I like to thank you Mr. Chairman, the Secretary General ITU the delegates, member countries and Government of Turkey for the nice arrangements, grand hospitality and for successfully organizing the WTDC-02 Conference in Istanbul Turkey.