ICT development is a necessity for Africa - Kufuor

Accra, July 13, GNA - President John Agyekum Kufuor on Friday said Information Communication Technology ICT was no longer a matter of choice but a necessity for enhancing innovation, competitiveness and modernization.

This, he said, would usher in opportunities in the achievement of the collective objectives in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to bridge the gap between the rich and poor.

Speaking at the 7th annual ICT African Investment Summit in Accra, President Kufuor said the issue of digital divide was a big challenge facing Africa that required redoubling of efforts to minimize the growing divide as well as harvesting the benefits of ICT to improve the living conditions of the people.

The four-day summit, which is being organized by Kemilinks International, a global consultancy firm in collaboration with Ministry of Communications, is on the theme, "Strategies for Low Cost Broadband Access in Africa".

The summit, among other things, seeks to come out with strategies to harness the enormous ICT opportunities in Africa to the rapid development of the continent with ICT being the driving force. President Kufuor said in the 21st century, product processes as well as management were all being driven by network of digital highways and ICT value added services.

"It is precisely because of these challenge that we require the combined effort of our governments, business community, the academia and civil society, the kind of mix that we have assembled in this summit, to encourage public-private partnership in addressing the issues involved."

President Kufuor noted that it was a great encouragement that the people of Africa were determined to work together and tackle the challenges facing the continent.

The President said Africa continued to trail behind the globe on all major indicators such as GDP, per capita, tele-density, human development index, literacy, child mortality and life expectancy, despite the fact that Africa was one of the fastest growing continents in the field of ICT.

President Kufuor said the government of Ghana on her part considered ICT as a very important sector that was critical in the socio-economic development.

Ghana, he said, had therefore developed ICT for development policy with strategies and plans that were designed to specifically accelerate the country's development process towards the realization of the vision to transform Ghana into information-rich knowledge-based society and economy by the year 2015.

Dr. Hamadou Toure, Secretary General of International Telecommunication Union, mentioned three priorities for the Accra summit as bridging the digital divide, cyber security and emergency communication in times of natural disasters. He noted that there were three billion ICT users in the world and by the year 2015 the other half would have been connected but Africa formed just a fraction of it.

The Accra summit and other upcoming ones would ensure that the appropriate frameworks and strategies were put in place to connect Africa.

"There is the need for a global alliance to ensure cyber security and also development of communications technologies for disasters and these are the other critical issues that will be addressed in subsequent summits," he added. 13 July 07