World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators Symposium
Opening Ceremony
Monday 10 December 2018
Geneva, Switzerland
Opening Speech, Mr Brahima Sanou, Director
ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau
Mr Mohammed Al-Ramsi, Executive Director, Regulatory Affairs, Telecommunications Regulatory Authority, United Arab Emirates, and Chair of WTIS-18,
Distinguished guests,
Ladies and gentlemen,
It is my great pleasure to welcome you to the 16th World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators Symposium here in Geneva.
WTIS has evolved to become one of the most important events on the ITU calendar as it is the main global forum for telecommunication and information society measurement.
This year's symposium will address the impact of ICTs and emerging technologies on social and economic development. We need statistics to assess these impacts because data and indicators feed the models that help us understand how ICTs are changing our economies and societies.
We need high-quality data for us to report on the state of the information society in each country. These data should be based on internationally agreed methodologies, so that we all speak the same language, can run the same models to track our own progress and compare ourselves with other countries.
It is for this reason that we made sure we invited to this Symposium both producers and users of data.
Tomorrow we will launch the Measuring the Information Society Report 2018. As you already know, the report is the most authoritative source for ICT data and for monitoring the development of the global information society.
This year, the report discusses the current state of ICTs, based on data collected by the ITU from our Member States and takes a critical look at the skills that people need to have in order to effectively use ICTs, now and in the future. The report further discusses revenue and investment in the ICT sector, and presents the results of our price data collection.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Following the revision of the ICT Development Index methodology and the ICT indicators which saw the inclusion of 5 new indicators, ITU organized and ran capacity building workshops in all the regions. However, as you see in the presentation by ITU staff, ITU has noted that countries are facing challenges in collecting and submitting quality data and that some of the data submitted by countries are not in line with ITU's agreed methodology resulting in the data not being sufficiently harmonized.
For these reasons, ITU has decided to postpone the publication of the IDI to 2019. This decision is to ensure that the IDI results are based on real country data and not mainly on estimates.
I am pleased to note that we will have a dedicated session tomorrow to discuss the new IDI methodology and indicators in terms of data availability challenges at national level. The session will also discuss the new methodology for estimating missing data, and provide an opportunity for those countries that have been more successful in providing data to share their experiences.
Ladies and gentlemen,
At this point, I want to thank our two expert groups that are incredibly important to our work. The two groups deliver the technical expertise on how to capture technological advances through new definitions and methodologies.
I take this opportunity to thank all the Member States, International Organizations, industry, and experts that support the work of ITU in this area.
I thank Mr. Mohammed Al-Ramsi, Executive Director, Regulatory Affairs, Telecommunications Regulatory Authority, United Arab Emirates, who accepted to chair WTIS-18. I am sure we will have a successful Symposium under his leadership.
