Speech by Malcolm Johnson, ITU Deputy Secretary-General
WSIS Forum 2016 - Closing Ceremony
6 May 2016, Geneva, Switzerland
Excellencies,
Ladies and gentlemen,
Welcome to the closing ceremony of the WSIS Forum 2016.
I hope you found the week both productive, informative and enjoyable. This year, the Forum attracted more that 2000 WSIS Stake holders from more that 150 countries.
We were honoured to have here so many high-level representatives from the wide WSIS Stakeholder community: more that 85 Ministers and Deputy-Ministers, many Ambassadors, CEOs, academia and Civil Society, all actively contributing. The highlight of course was the presence and address of His Excellency the Prime Minister of Tonga.
We were very pleased to see that the number of remote participants increased tremendously this year.
Thanks to the engagement of all stakeholders: governments, civil society, academia, private sector and technical community, the WSIS Forum has proven to be an efficient mechanism for coordination of multi-stakeholder implementation activities, information exchange, creation of knowledge, sharing of best practices and assistance in developing multi-stakeholder and public/private partnerships to advance the WSIS goals and the sustainable development goals.
As proof of our commitment to the outcome orientation of the WSIS Forum I have a great pleasure in informing you that outcomes of the WSIS Forum are now available on the website, including the following:
I thank and congratulate all those that worked hard this week to achieve this output so quickly. These documents will be submitted to the CSTD for consideration at the meeting taking place next week.
I believe this event has demonstration excellent collaboration within the UN system. The WSIS Forum, is co-organized by ITU, UNESCO, UNDP and UNCTAD, in close collaboration with all WSIS Action Line Facilitators/Co-Facilitators (UNDESA, FAO, UNEP, WHO, UN Women, WIPO, WFP, ILO, WMO, ITC, UPU, UNODC, UNICEF and the UN Regional Commissions). I would like to thank all our colleagues for their great spirit of collaboration and efforts to strengthen the Forum as a unique platform for discussing ICTs as means for implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Thanks also to the High-level Track Facilitators that moderated the High Level Policy Track panel discussions, which I believe everyone found to be a very good innovation this year.
And thanks especially to the Chairman of the WSIS Forum 2016, Ambassador Daniel Sepulveda, for his leadership and guidance.
I would like to thank the partners who have so generously contributed to making this year’s WSIS Forum a success, and without whom it would not have been possible:
- Our platinum partner, the United Arab Emirates, in particular its Telecommunication Regulatory Authority, for its support since the inception of WSIS Forum.
- Our Partners for Specific Activities: Japan, Saudi Arabia and Switzerland.
- Our contributing partners: Poland, Rwanda, ICANN, the IEEE, the Internet Society, and IFIP.
And all our supporting partners.
I encourage you all to continue supporting WSIS Forum and our preparations for the 2017 edition of the Forum which will start in September.
Finally let me thank our WSIS Team led by Jaroslaw Ponder, ably supported by Gitanjali Sah and the rest of the team, and especially our interns who have voluntarily worked hard to support this year’s event.
Thank you all, I wish you a safe journey home and I look forward to seeing you all here again next year.