Republic of Serbia national launch event:
ITU Study on the Assessment of Digital Accessibility Policies
Opening Remarks
Doreen Bogdan-Martin, Director
ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau
1 June 2021
Your Excellency, Ana Brnabić, Prime Minister of Serbia,
Heads of National Authorities,
Members of the media,
Ladies and gentlemen,
It is a great pleasure to join you today for Serbia's national launch of the ITU Study on the Assessment of Digital Accessibility Policies.
Today's event represents another important milestone in our joint effort to build an inclusive digital world founded on equal opportunities for all.
This assessment is an essential component of the Accessible Europe Initiative, which seeks to foster enabling environments and inclusive digital societies across the European region.
The Accessible Europe Initiative continues to engage all countries and stakeholders across Europe through activities including direct assistance, policy guidance and regional events and competitions to identify innovative accessible solutions.
It is a fundamental component of the Regional Initiative for Europe on digital inclusion adopted by our last World Telecommunication Development Conference in recognition of the importance of digital accessibility in ensuring that no one is left behind.
Already, an estimated 15% of the global population – or around one billion people – live with some form of disability. Europe alone is home to an estimated 80 million persons with disabilities. In the face of an aging population and the increasing prevalence of non-communicable medical conditions, this number seems certain to grow.
Persons with disabilities are an integral part of today's digital society, yet all too often they are at risk of discrimination and socio-economic exclusion.
To make matters worse, the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the challenges they face in terms of access to essential services such as education, health, and employment opportunities.
ITU, as the UN specialized agency for digital technologies, is strongly committed to advancing digital accessibility.
Accessibility is embedded in the Union's strategic goals and targets, with our members affirming that enabling environments ensuring accessible ICTs for persons with disabilities should be established in all countries by 2023.
ITU's new ICT Accessibility Assessment for the Europe region is the product of many months of collaborative work with European administrations and regional organizations.
I take this opportunity to thank them for their outstanding cooperation.
Together, we were able to arrive at a clear picture of the status of digital accessibility across the region, and identify the gaps we still need to fill through targeted and effective actions.
Ladies and gentlemen,
I would like to thank the Prime Minister for her commitment to taking concrete steps to make an inclusive digital society a reality in Serbia.
It has been a great pleasure for ITU to accompany Serbia on this journey.
On behalf of my team, let me thank the many experts and collaborators from national institutions for the hard work and engagement which have brought us to this moment.
Today's launch lays the groundwork for advancing the digital accessibility agenda at the national level.
It provides an updated overview of the status of ICT accessibility and digital inclusion in Serbia, along with a set of good practices and recommendations for national policymakers and stakeholders on how to ensure inclusiveness is always taken into account across a range of key domains.
We look forward to continuing to support Serbia in its efforts to advance digital accessibility, and stand ready to assist any other ITU member in improving digital inclusion and ensuring that persons with disabilities enjoy full and unfettered access to the power of digital communications and the online world.
Ladies and gentlemen,
We continue to live in very challenging times, with the COVID pandemic far from over, and the importance of connectivity never more apparent.
ITU will soon hold its next World Telecommunication Development Conference at the invitation of the government of Ethiopia.
This landmark event seeks to dramatically redraw the digital connectivity roadmap, with a view to leveraging the transformational power of digital to accelerate progress towards the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals.
I am convinced that digital inclusion, and in particular digital accessibility, will play an increasingly central role in any new global agenda for connectivity, and I encourage you all to become active participants in the preparatory process for this important global event.
Before I close, let me once again congratulate the Government of Serbia on its ongoing efforts to promote connectivity and digital transformation.
Serbia can pride itself on having become a reference country on the global stage, with concrete steps undertaken to meet its commitment to connect 99% of households to high-speed internet by 2025, as well as its leveraging of digital in the pandemic response through the launch of the eUprava e-government portal, which enabled Serbia to play a key role in expanding rapid access to vaccinations.
So once more, I thank the Prime Minister and her government for Serbia's engagement and commitment to helping shape Europe's digital future and define regional priorities to advance digital transformation to build back better, and I look forward very much to a very active future collaboration.
Thank you.
