ITU Plenipotentiary: Together for a connected digital future

The global conference coming up in Qatar is about connecting the unconnected and ensuring the whole world benefits from digital technologies.

For billions of people, the digital future remains out of reach. Despite decades of progress, an estimated 2.2 billion people were still not using the Internet by 2025.

Even where networks reach, services often remain unaffordable or people lack basic digital skills. As the world goes digital, those gaps carry growing economic and social consequences.

Closing connectivity gaps is a shared global challenge calling for coordinated investment, accelerated innovation, and practical international policy cooperation.

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) brings together governments, the private sector, academia, the technical community and civil society to manage radio frequencies, promote responsible technology standards, and drive digital development for the common good of humanity.

In November 2026, ITU Member States will gather in Doha, Qatar, for the next ITU Plenipotentiary Conference, PP-26.

There, at the organization’s highest decision-making conference, they will lay out strategic priorities for the next four years and discuss the issues shaping everyone’s connected digital future.

“PP-26 will set ITU’s direction at a time of unprecedented technological change,” said Doreen Bogdan-Martin, ITU Secretary-General. “ITU is grateful to Qatar for bringing our members together in Doha to make key decisions that will shape our shared digital future.”

Alongside planning and administration, PP-26 will focus on five main themes.

1. Expanding connectivity infrastructure and investment

Connecting everyone meaningfully by 2030 would take between USD 2.6 trillion and USD 2.8 trillion worth of investment, including about 1.6 trillion for physical infrastructure, according to ITU’s Connecting Humanity Action Blueprint. Making it happen depends on public-private partnerships, innovative financing models and supportive regulatory models that push to connect underserved areas where commercial deployment remains difficult.

2. Strengthening the resilience of infrastructure

Digital infrastructure now supports everything from finance and healthcare to transportation and government operations. When digital systems fail, the impact can spread across countries and continents before anyone knows it. Potential vulnerabilities arising from solar storms, earthquakes, and other hazards – as well as cyber threats and risks to physical infrastructure like submarine cables – have put the spotlight on the need for resilience. In today’s interconnected world, no single country or institution can do it alone.

3. Ensuring reliable emergency and humanitarian communications

When disasters strike, digital connectivity is a lifeline. Early warning systems – increasingly enhanced by artificial intelligence (AI) – save lives, help protect property, and enable emergency services to respond in time. ITU mobilizes cooperation on warning dissemination through the Early Warnings for All initiative and actively promotes cell-broadcast alerts, satellite links, and AI innovation to bolster hazard and disaster readiness.

4. Advancing space-based connectivity and sustainability

Space-based systems now cover the globe, providing new options to connect the hardest-to-reach communities. Integrating terrestrial and satellite networks has become a key priority for governments and regulators, with more than 80 countries now active in the space sector. At the same time, the growing numbers of satellites in orbit raise challenges for radio spectrum management, orbital coordination, and keeping space viable for future generations.

5. Harnessing emerging technologies for development

AI and other emerging technologies promise to improve public services, enhance productivity and create new economic opportunities. Yet such benefits depend on infrastructure, skills, and policy conditions. ITU facilitates international cooperation on technical standards to promote interoperability, trust and the inclusive adoption of emerging technologies worldwide. It also supports countries through capacity-building programmes. Through initiatives such as AI for Good and the AI Skills Coalition, ITU works with partners to expand AI knowledge and capabilities and help address skills gaps.

A chance to share policies and strengthen consensus

During the opening week of PP-26, countries will showcase achievements, share digital development plans, point out emerging challenges, and identify priorities for international cooperation. ITU encourages delegates to align their interventions with the overarching goals universal connectivity and sustainable digital transformation.

ITU has provided guidelines for delegates on their PP-26 policy statements.

PP-26 discussions and decisions will also build further on ITU’s consultations with governments and the digital industry through the recent World Telecommunication/ICT Policy Forum (WTPF-26), which focused on digital inclusion, environmental impact, resilience, space connectivity and digital entrepreneurship, seeking common ground on global digital issues ahead of the Plenipotentiary in Doha.

Shaping the digital sector under one roof

Alongside ITU’s highest decision-making conference, Qatar is hosting the latest Mobile World Congress – MWC26 Doha – at the same venue between 8 and 10 November, aiming for the widest possible gathering of governments, international institutions and industry leaders involved in shaping the digital sector.

Co-location at the Doha Exhibition and Convention Center (DECC) will give ITU delegates an up-close look at how advanced connectivity, AI and digital infrastructure are accelerating growth and progress in practical applications worldwide.

What happens at PP-26

The Plenipotentiary Conference will elect candidates for ITU’s five top leadership positions – the Secretary-General, Deputy Secretary-General and Directors of the Radiocommunication, Telecommunication Standardization, and Telecommunication Development Bureaux. It will also decide the 48 Member States to serve on the ITU Council and the members of the Radio Regulations Board (RRB) for their 2027-2030 terms.

The conference will also decide on broad organizational policies and approve ITU’s strategic and financial plans for 2028-2031, with global implications for satellite communications, AI and digital inclusion for underserved communities.

Around 3,000 delegates are expected to take part, including dignitaries from ITU’s 194 Member States, as well as representatives from industry.

While each country grapples with different challenges, ITU and host country Qatar aim to bring the world together for a connected digital future.

Header image credit: Adobe Stock