Keynote Address by Malcolm Johnson, ITU Deputy Secretary-General
Digital Dialogue: “ICTs for Persons with Disabilities"
10 August 2020 - Virtual Session
Nameste – I am delighted to be with you today at this Digital Dialogue on accessibility to ICTs for persons with disabilities, and the launch of the White Paper. Many thanks to Broadband India Forum for inviting me, in particular my good friend T V Ramachandran. It is a honour to join the distinguished panellists especially my good friend former ambassador J S Deepak – nice to see you back in the telcoms sector Sir.
I am very happy to continue the excellent collaboration we have between ITU and BIF especially on this important issue which has always been a key priority for me and a subject in which I have taken a very personal interest ever since I joined ITU as Director of the Telecommunication Standardization Bureau (TSB) in 2007.
It is estimated that around a billion people worldwide live with some form of disability. One in every seven of the world’s inhabitants. This covers a wide range of disabilities – from people with chronic conditions to those who are hard of hearing or suffering from age related disabilities such as loss of vision. ITU recognises that in order to achieve our number one objective – to connect the world – then we must include all these persons with disabilities.
It is of great concern that people with specialized needs are at risk of being excluded from the online world – an even greater concern at this time when so many people rely on the Internet to access the latest news, public health updates and travel restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
How difficult it must be to surf the Internet if you only see very badly or not at all. How difficult it must be to make a phone call using a standard mobile handset without a text conversion app if you are hard-of hearing or deaf? Or to use any device if you are paralysed.
Access to ICTs for all people is essential to ensure no one is disadvantaged and is necessary for governments to fulfil their obligations under key treaties such as the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
ITU, and the UN more broadly, recognize that principles of universal design, affordability and equal opportunities to access ICTs and assistive technologies are key for building inclusive societies.
I am proud that ITU was one of the first international standards bodies to address accessibility issues. As early as 1994 it adopted the first international text telephone standard: Recommendation ITU-T V.18. This standard enabled different (and previously incompatible) text telephones in different countries to interoperate. It was the first step towards universal design for accessible telecommunication products.
I am also proud that my first World Telecommunication Standards Assembly as TSB Director in 2008 was a major step forward in mainstreaming accessibility in ITU.
This event adopted the historic Resolution 70, the first ITU Resolution on accessibility which recognises the importance of the work on accessibility and mandated ITU to document best practice, review its services and facilities for accessibility, and to work on programmes to progress accessibility in developing countries.
Recognising that standards have an enormously important role to play in making ICTs more accessible, the Resolution required the development of an ‘Accessibility Checklist’ to ensure that all new ITU standards incorporate the needs of people with disabilities. The Resolution also called on ITU to work collaboratively and cooperatively with other standardization organizations and entities in the interest of ensuring that ongoing work in the field of accessibility is taken into account, and to avoid duplication.
We also created the joint coordination activity on accessibility and human factors (JCA-AHF) which is a group open to all experts working in the field of accessibility to better improve coordination of accessibility work in ITU and between ITU and other bodies.
The first Global Standards Symposium which preceded the 2008 Assembly had leaders of industry, government ministers, heads of regulatory bodies and standards bodies recognise accessibility to telecom/ICT services as a major enabler to economic and social development, especially since a significant percentage of persons with disabilities are poor and live in developing countries.
Since then, ITU’s accessibility experts have helped to incorporate accessibility needs into standards for multimedia, network interoperability, teleconferencing, next generation networks and most importantly created the concept of Total Conversation with real time text.
Some of our more recent examples of ITU’s standards on accessibility cover areas such as:
o
An audio-based indoor and outdoor network navigation system for persons with vision impairment:
ITU-T F.921 o
And, Safe listening guidelines and standards which support WHO’s “
Make Listening Safe” initiative to improve listening practices in particular for young people when they are exposed to music and other sounds at noisy entertainment venues, and when they listen to music and other audio content through personal audio devices. The standard was launched last year with India’s Grammy award-winning musician Ricky Kej performing a “Sound of Life” concert at the WHO.
All these standards are available on our website free of charge, as are all ITU’s standards.
ITU is also looking at how technology innovations, such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) should be designed to take account of the needs of persons with disabilities. We are continuing our collaboration with WHO in a
joint Focus Group on AI for Health to examine issues relating to the use of private and confidential health data to train AI and machine learning models. This Focus Group is open to any interested party to participate in free of charge.
And the importance of accessibility was recognized at the highest level in ITU at the Plenipotentiary Conference in 2018 which set a target to establish enabling environments to ensure accessible telecommunications/ICTs for persons with disabilities in all ITU Member States by 2030.
So, with this background you can see why I was very happy to join you today for the launch of the BIF White Paper on “ICT Accessibility for Persons with Disabilities in India”. I would like to congratulate BIF, and Dr. Nirmita in particular, for this very impressive and excellent document, and I am sure its recommendations will greatly help persons with disabilities in India.
You are setting the example for others to follow on how to build inclusive societies and we in ITU look forward to working with you towards that goal.
Programmes such as the ‘Accessible India Campaign’ (Sugamya Bharat Abhiyan) show that to advance the inclusion of persons with disabilities we need to involve all stakeholders.
And in ITU we are fortunate to have, in addition to our 193 Member States, over 900 sector members including all leading telecom and Internet companies as well as academia and other regional and international organisations.
India is one of the oldest members of ITU going back over 150 years and has around 20 sector members and academia members. With the establishment of the new ITU area office in Delhi shortly I very much hope we will have many more members from India and even greater collaboration in the future, including on accessibility.
I invite you to widely apply ITU’s recommendations and best practices on accessibility in the implementation of this policy and contribute to the work in ITU to help create a truly inclusive Indian digital society.
Together we can help to improve the lives of so many people, especially the poor and disadvantaged in the remote and rural areas of India.
Thank you and I wish you every success with your White Paper.