INTERNATIONAL TELECOMMUNICATION UNION

The Current and Future State of the Telecommunications Industry
Address by Dr Pekka Tarjanne, Secretary-General, International Telecommunication Union (ITU)
Minneapolis, 30 June 1997
Madame Ambassador,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It gives me great pleasure indeed to be here today in Minneapolis, and to have the opportunity of addressing you after such an excellent lunch.
The rather formidable title of my address this afternoon is ‘The Current and Future State of the Telecommunications Industry’. I say formidable, because as we all know, the world in which we operate is transforming itself so quickly that it is often difficult simply to keep pace – and it is a brave man indeed who readily accepts the challenge of predicting the future under such conditions. To quote one of the industry’s leading figures, Mr Robert Allen, of AT&T, “If anyone in this room can tell me what the telecommunications industry will look like in three years’ time, then I’d like to know what they’re on!”
That said, there are some trends emerging which are likely to have a long-term impact on the way telecommunications develops, and on the way, ultimately, that you and I – and perhaps particularly our children – will communicate with one another, and with the rest of the world.
The liberalization of the world’s telecommunications markets – a process which began perhaps a decade ago, but which has been given much additional impetus by the recent World Trade Organization agreement on Trade in Telecommunication Services – will profoundly change the global telecommunications environment. Recent ITU figures put the value of telecommunications trade in equipment and services at some 100 billion US dollars in 1996. As the world continues to move inexorably towards the Information Age, and becomes increasingly reliant on the electronic exchange and dissemination of information, there is no doubt that this figure will continue to grow exponentially. Telecommunications is rapidly becoming an essential strategic resource for business, on a par with labour and capital. Those who learn to master and develop this resource will be the future winners in the global information economy.
The phenomenal growth of the Internet is of course another feature of today’s environment which is reshaping the way we work and live. In the future, electronic commerce and computer-based global information networks – such as the Internet – will account for a substantial proportion of telecommunications traffic and revenues. And they will have a significant effect on the way tomorrow’s telecommunications networks develop. The ITU, conscious of the need to involve its Members in the development of what is already one of the lynch-pins of the emerging Global Information Infrastructure, has already taken a first step in contributing to the enhancement of these new information systems, by accepting a role as depository of the Memorandum of Understanding on Internet Generic Top-Level Domain Names.
We are also witnessing, today, the birth of another new type of communication system: the Global Mobile Personal Communication by Satellite systems, which promise to bring seamless high-quality voice and data services to the four corners of the world, regardless of geographic or climatic impediments, or poor local telecommunications infrastructure. These systems will represent, for many of the world’s people, their first real chance to communicate freely with the rest of the world, and is truly a great step forward in the development of Marshall McLuhan’s famous vision of the ‘Global Village’.
In this environment of change and transition, the ITU too is having to re-invent itself to deal with today’s new challenges and the challenges of the future. As the world’s oldest intergovernmental organization, it is possible to imagine that we are a little set in our ways, and resistant to change. Quite the contrary is true. Since our founding in Paris in 1865, we have witnessed the birth of the telephone, radiocommunications, communications satellites, the fax machine, global high speed computer networks, and now the networks within networks which make up today’s complex communications infrastructure. Indeed, when I walked into the ITU on my first day as Secretary General – not so very long ago – the World Wide Web had not even been invented, and the telex was still a principal means of communication for many of our Members.
Throughout the last 132 years, the ITU has worked to embrace each new technology, and to reshape its work and methods to adapt to new environments. Today is no different, and as we approach next year’s Plenipotentiary Conference, here in Minneapolis, we are already reviewing our role, to ensure that we remain an effective player in the global telecommunications community, as well as an essential resource for our Members.
1998’s Minneapolis Plenipotentiary will be one of the most important conferences the ITU has ever held. As with the development of radiocommunications, and later of voice telephony, we are facing a future which will be profoundly transformed by new technologies and new, perhaps as-yet-undreamt-of ways of communicating. Convergence between our industry and the audio-visual entertainment and computing industries will spawn new types of equipment, and new ways of working and playing.
In the lead up to next year’s conference, ITU Council last week examined the report of the Working Group known as ITU 2000. It is the task of this group to re-orient the ITU’s mission to position it for a new era, and to identify priorities and strategies which need to be addressed and developed to keep our organization relevant and effective. The Group has made a number of important recommendations, including an enhanced role for the private sector in the work of the Union, the fostering of closer working arrangements with other international and regional organizations, such as the WTO, new approaches to funding and cost recovery, the implementation of new, project-based working methods where appropriate, and a strengthening of the role of the ITU in facilitating partnerships between telecommunications entities with a view to promoting development, in particular in the Least Developed Countries.
The vision outlined in this document, along with the Strategic Plan of the Union for the years 1999-2003, will form the basis of our work in Minneapolis, and will determine in a most fundamental way the future of our organization. For the ITU to have the great future it deserves, we must, as we have done before, embrace rather than resist the changes taking place around us. The information revolution, which has become somewhat of a cliché in the press, is a daily reality for us at the ITU. We remain unique as an intergovernmental organization, in our leading role in the global information society, in our ability to bridge the gap between the developed and developing worlds, and in our capacity to foster links between the private sector, government and global and regional organizations.
I look forward to bringing my organization to the beginnings of a new era at the Plenipotentiary Conference in Minneapolis in 1998, and to prepare the ITU to start along the uncharted highways of the New Telecommunications World. I would like to leave you today with a most apt quotation from the Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, borrowed from the address of this year’s distinguished ITU Council Chairman, Mr Mauricio Bossa: “Traveller, there are no roads. The road is made by the traveller.”
Thank you.