Wednesday, 6 October Portugal This has in fact contributed to Portugal being the sec-ond and of promoting digital literacy amongst students, trainees and teachers. country with the higher mobile broadband pene-tration, according to a European Commission’s report. This common project was formally announced at the last World Telecommunication Development Conference in Hyderabad and we can proudly inform you that a memorandum of understating, formalizing this project, was signed by Dr. Touré and by the por-tuguese Also in the context of our technological plan, and fol-lowing the European Union policy, the Portuguese Government has recently announced the Digital Agenda, comprised of a set of action lines based on principles such as a national next generation network; better governance; an education of excellence, e-health Minister for Communications, in a ceremony that took place last week, in Lisbon. and mobility. We are convinced that the Digital Twenty countries will benefit from this first phase of the program, with the initiative supporting the launch of one connected school project per country. Each project will test innovative approaches using ICT in the classroom, measure the impact, showcase the benefits and share lessons learned. Agenda two thousand and fifteen will be fundamen-tal to the success of the Portuguese economy and for the innovation and modernization of our country through the use of information and communication technologies. Fellow delegates, Portugal is standing for election to the Council at this Conference. Throughout this period, Portugal has fully supported the aims of the ITU and contributed for its development. We are enthusiastic to continue and reinvigorate that contribution. Ladies and gentleman, broadband inclusion is not a new cause of concern for Portugal. In reality, it has been one of the main priorities of the Portuguese Government in the last years – we have launched what we called the ‘technological plan’, aimed at pro-viding In the spirit of the World Summit on Information Society, we recognize that the benefits of the informa-tion a wide access to Information Technology by the Portuguese people. In this context, a number of initia-tives, technology should be accessible for all. Portugal the ‘e-initiatives’, have been put in place, in par-ticular to promote increased access to broadband. is fully committed to turning this digital divide into a digital opportunity for all. Allow me to refer in particular to the e.School program that was launched in June two thousand and seven by the Portuguese Government. This program aims at promoting access to the information society through the dissemination of laptops connected to broadband Internet in all schools, in order to increase info-inclu-sion If Members decide to favour us, I can assure you of nothing less than our reinforced commitment and en-gagement, continuing the ongoing projects and em-barking in new ones, if we have the opportunity. We do believe we still have a positive contribution to make! in Portugal. To date, approximately one million Thank you very much for your attention. and three hundred laptops have been distributed, reaching more than one million mobile connections. 177