Friday, 22 October ITU WTSA.And of course many of us also partici-pated in the World Telecommunication Development Zhao, who has been a perfect partner in this four-year journey, and the Directors of BR, TSB and BDT, to whom I want to say how much I have appreciated their col-laboration Conference, which was held in India at the end of May this year, and which set forth the ambitious work pro-gramme since Antalya. for the Development Sector for the next four In the past four years, we have seen the number of mo-bile years. With the results of this WTDC, ITU’s develop-ment cellular subscriptions nearly double, to reach five work now more clearly encompasses developing billion, and we have seen the number of people using the Internet reach nearly two billion. countries. The success in the first decade of the 21st century in terms of growth in the ICT sector could not have been achieved without ITU-D. In terms of our own work, we have seen a number of landmark events over the past four years which have been undertaken at the request of Membership, and which have acted as cornerstones and guiding bea-cons Other landmark events include the World Telecommunication Policy Forum, which was held in Portugal and which addressed a number of high-level issues right across the ICT sector, and which attracted great support from the Membership. The Forum ena-bled for the ICT sector during this time. I cannot detail everything we have done in four years – we are short of time – but let me single out a hand-ful ITU to address the key issues of ICTs and climate change, and ICTs and the global financial crisis. We all know that this sector – our sector – has been the most resilient of all sectors during the economic crisis, and I think it is safe to say that ICTs came to the rescue of the world during this crisis. of truly exceptional events and milestones, and list some of the key initiatives we have undertaken. In terms of landmark events, each of the Sectors has of course held its major conference or assembly, start-ing with the hugely productive and successful World The WTPF also addressed the implications of conver-gence Radiocommunication Conference which was held in Geneva at the end of 2007. and the emergence of new technologies; the transition to next-generation networks; Internet-related The importance of WRC-07 can only be compared to the importance of the digital world we live in, a world always connected, a world always on the move. A mo-bile public policy matters; and the International Telecommunication Regulations. Over the four-year cycle we also staged successful re-gional world, where the future is sure to be shaped, at ITU Telecom events in Cairo, Egypt, and Bangkok, least in part, by mobile broadband. Thailand, in 2008; and held the ITU Telecom World event in Geneva in October 2009. Over the same pe-riod WRC-07 was followed by the World Telecommunication Standardization Assembly, which was held in South Africa at the end of 2008, and which saw greater at-tendance we also successfully transformed the annual WSIS Forum into a more useful, meaningful – and it must be said well-attended – event. and more issues dealt with than ever be-fore. While I was in the process of re-centring ITU’s Following the World Summit on the Information Society and the Antalya Plenipotentiary Conference, work around our core activities, our standardization work was strengthened and energized at this very suc-cessful 221