In October 2022, ITU’s Plenipotentiary Conference 2022 in Bucharest adopted a revised text of
Resolution 131. This new text (Rev. Bucharest, 2022) defines, inter alia, the main features of the process for developing and adopting a new IDI methodology and of the IDI itself.
In this context, and in line with
instructs 8 to the BDT Director, the Secretariat prepared a
Zero draft document, which described a possible framework and structure for the IDI, to inform, facilitate and expedite the process. This document was posted on a discussion forum dedicated to the new IDI (IDI Forum), where members of the
Expert Group on ICT Household Indicators (EGH) and of the
Expert Group on Telecommunication/ICT Indicators (EGTI) were invited to share feedback on the draft methodology, comments and suggestions. More than 200 members signed up for the IDI Forum and almost 100 comments were posted. A document with a compilation of all the comments received on the content and the respective responses from the ITU Secretariat was produced and posted on the IDI Forum.
The Zero draft document was revised in light of the comments received to produce a
Version 1 document, which also contained additional proposals related to the treatment of outliers, aggregation and weighting. A compilation of all the comments received and the Secretariat’s responses to each of them were appended as Annex 4 to the Version 1 document.
In
Circular BDT/DKH/IDA/009, Member States were invited to comment on the Version 1 document, as per
instructs the Director of the Telecommunication Development Bureau 7 of Resolution 131. The period of consultation for Member States ran from 21 April 2023 to 19 May 2023. Fourteen Member States submitted a total of 71 comments.
Based on these comments, the Secretariat updated the Version 1 document and produced a
Version 2 document. Annex 4 of that document featured a compilation of the comments submitted by Member States on the Version 1 document and the Secretariat’s responses to each of them.
Following these consultations, the ITU Secretariat identified outstanding issues, which were presented in the Version 2 document. These outstanding issues were discussed at the
virtual joint meeting of EGTI and EGH from 13 to 15 June 2023 (
Circular BDT/DKH/IDA/007).
Following the meeting, the Secretariat updated the methodology to reflect the outcomes of the meeting and produced
Version 3 of the methodology.
During its
2023 July session, ITU Council noted developments and requested that an additional meeting be organized ahead of the final consultation of Member States. Accordingly,
a joint EGTI/EGH session on the IDI was held on 18-19 September 2023 (
Circular BDT/DKH/IDA/013). Following the meeting, the ITU Secretariat produced Version 3.1 of the methodology, which was submitted to Member States for approval in October 2023 (
Circular BDT/DKH/IDA/015).
More on the history of the IDI.