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IP3 at WSIS 2012

IP3 AT THE WORLD SUMMIT ON THE INFORMATION SOCIETY (WSIS) FORUM – MAY 2012

IP3 sent its Marketing Director, Vice Chairman Strategic Relations and Chairman to Geneva in May 2012 to participate in the World Summit on the Information Society 2012 Forum.  This activity is one of two major undertakings that the IP3 Board decided on and came from a suggestion from Professor Raymond Morel well known IFIP GA member.  We presented a Thematic Workshop entitled “Improving Economic Development, Regional GDP, Innovation, Education, Skills, Sustainability, and Security by creating and growing a professional ICT workforce” which formed part of the WSIS Forum 2012 Program  The summary of the Thematic Workshop outcomes is available here.

This trip was funded in part from the IP3 budget and an allocation from ACS in support of the IP3 chairman’s activities.

The World Summit on the Information Society is a very large undertaking, over 1200 delegates attended in Geneva.  Those present included high-ranking government officials, Ambassadors, senior industry people as well as movie stars and those representing you and me as citizens in the civil society.  Most sessions were serviced by interpreters in English, French, German and Arabic.

Stephen Ibaraki (IP3 Vice Chairman Strategic Relations) was there as an accredited media representative as well and as such was able to engage in dialogue with many of the senior people present including the Secretary-General of the ITU, Dr Hamadoun Touré.

Some of the people we met and have established contacts with include:

  • Ajay Mishra, Global Head of Industry Environment, India and Emerging Markets, Chairman of the ITU-T Focus Group – From innovation to standards who has invited me to get involved with the Focus Group
  • Prof. Jan Pawlowski, Professor Digital Media global Information Systems at the University of Jyvaskyla Finland
  • His Excellency Benedicto Filho, Brazilian Ambassador, Director Dept for Scientific and Technological themes
  • Ester Maestro Ciber Volunteers from Madrid
  • Hatam Hocini, Information Society Director Algerian Ministry of Poste and Telecommunications
  • Christoph Legutko, Intel’s Global Public Policy CEE Director, Legal and Corporate Affairs

and leaders from Intel, Microsoft, Google, Dell, HP, the US State Department

Our Thematic Workshop was held late on Wednesday, however, it attracted an audience in the room of 16 and two remote participants including one of our speakers, Lawrence Gudza from the Computer Society of Zimbabwe.  This result was consistent with most Thematic Workshop audiences and given that there were 10 concurrent workshops held in this late time slot, it was an acceptable participation rate.

Moira de Roche, the honorary Marketing Director, being from South Africa, was easily able to engage with other countries in that continent who were present and has a follow-up with a Tanzanian representative.  We were approached by a member of the Brazilian ICT Professional Society who was excited by the opportunities that IP3 accreditation offered to him and his fellow members and a senior civil servant from Algeria.

The Chairman managed to take the floor at each plenary session and most of the WSIS workshops and high-level dialogues she attended making sure IP3 was identified by name.  See her doing this (login as guest).

Benefits of IP3s participation in WSIS Forum 2012

  • A new audience for IP3 with access to high ranking government and industry representative which gives us the opportunity to sell the message to WSIS delegates and to engage with them on an ongoing basis.
  • Opportunity to significantly contribute to the aims of the WSIS in three of the 10 Action Lines AL C4 (Capacity Building), AL C5 (Building confidence and Security in the use of ICTs ), AL C10 (Ethical dimensions of the Information Society (UNESCO) ). The Chairman has been in conversation with the Chairman of the ITU-T Focus Group – From innovation to standards who are keen to have our participation in his Focus Group.

Conclusions

Our IFIP GA insider, Raymond Morel (pictured right with Stephen and Moira) attended most of the sessions on most days and was glad to have IP3 participate and create a presence amongst delegates.  It was agreed amongst us all that we should seek to increase our presence within the WSIS framework with the express purpose of promoting our mission amongst the stakeholders.