Contribution from the ITU Secretary-General to the work of the
Group of Friends of the Chair (GFC) of the WSIS PrepCom, Tunis Phase
1 December 2004
Operational document, chapter four "The Way Ahead"
1. The success of the Summit will depend, in no small measure, on effective follow-up and implementation after the completion of the Tunis Phase.
2. In line with the overall spirit of the Summit, follow-up and implementation are the responsibility of all stakeholders, working in partnership.
3. However, there is a requirement for some co-ordination among stakeholders and a reporting mechanism, as well as a division of labour among the different action lines set out in the Plan of Action.
4. It is possible, at this stage, to identify two possible options for the co-ordination and reporting mechanism.
Option A: To designate one or a few organizations, either completely new or existing ones (e.g., ITU, UNDP, UNESCO, UNCTAD) with overall responsibility to coordinate and report on the implementation of the Action Plan.
Option B: To set up a decentralised mechanism for joint actions among all stakeholders, with a reporting mechanism within the UN system.
5. In practice, Option A is probably not feasible because the scope of the Plan of Action falls outside the competence of any single existing organisation and the creation of a new organisation would impose an additional financial burden that stakeholders may not be willing to bear.
6. Therefore, Option B is preferred. A possible implementation mechanism could have the following characteristics:
a) For each Action Line in the Plan of Action, an inter-governmental organisation will be identified as moderator;
b) The moderator will be responsible for organising meeting(s) open to all stakeholders for the implementation of the Action Line;
c) The modalities of coordination will be decided by the respective stakeholder group;
d) The ITU/WSIS-ES will undertake an overall stocktaking exercise based on the annual outputs from these stakeholder groups;
e) The ITU Secretary-General, in his role as Secretary-General of the Summit, will make an annual report to the UN General Assembly, via the Economic and Social Council;
f) If the UN General Assembly considers that further actions are necessary, a follow-up meeting (or Summit) may be held.
7. The Annex to this document lists the action lines (and sub-actions) where follow-up and implementation would be required. The areas where ITU has competence, and is willing to act as a moderator, are indicated in the list.
Annex: Action Lines
Action Lines |
Proposed moderator |
|
C1. The role of governments and all stakeholders in the promotion of ICTs for Development |
-- |
|
C2. Information and communication infrastructure |
ITU |
|
C3. Access to information and knowledge |
-- |
|
C4. Capacity building |
-- |
|
C5. Building confidence and security in the use of ICTs |
ITU |
|
C6. Enabling environment |
ITU |
|
C7. ICT applications ● E-government ● E-business ● E-learning ● E-health ● E-employment ● E-environment ● E-agriculture ● E-science |
-- |
|
C8. Cultural diversity and identity, linguistic diversity and local content |
-- |
|
C9. Media |
-- |
|
C10. Ethical dimensions of the Information Society |
-- |
|
C11. International and regional cooperation |
-- |
|
B. Objectives, goals and targets |
-- |
|
D. Digital Solidarity |
-- |
|
E. Follow-up and evaluation |
ITU / WSIS-ES |