The WSIS en route to Tunis
| | News | 03 January 2005 |
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Author: M.H.J. van den Berg
 The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), which is to conclude in Tunis this year, has still some thorny issues to settle. One of these is how to bridge the 'digital divide' between North and South and, in particular, who is going to pay for it.
Read more on the WSIS in the latest issue of ICT Update, a bimonthly multimedia magazine on ICTs for rural development in African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries published by CTA, Wageningen, the Netherlands.
ICT Update 23 highlights key WSIS issues, including:
See also: ICT Update's annotated links to WSIS-related Events, Documents and Initiatives.
ICT Update is produced by Contactivity bv, Leiden, the Netherlands. | | | The WSIS brings together governments, United Nations agencies, ICT industry leaders, non-governmental organizations and media representatives in a single high-level policy making process.
The stated aim of the WSIS is to 'develop a clear statement of political will and a concrete plan of action to ensure that everyone can participate in the information society and benefit from the opportunities that ICTs can offer to create, access, utilize and share knowledge and information'. The WSIS is the first Summit to take place in two sessions - the first took place Geneva in December 2003, and the second will be held in Tunis from 16 to 18 November 2005. At the end of WSIS in Geneva, two issues remained unresolved: Internet governance and financing. Of these, the question of financing is of particular relevance to developing countries. At the Geneva Summit, President Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal, speaking on behalf of all developing countries, presented a proposal for the creation of a ‘Digital Solidarity Fund’ in support of the effort to 'bridge the digital divide' between North and South.
Mr Wade's proposal has been warmly received in the South. In Africa, where the issue of funding will feature prominently on the agenda of the regional WSIS Conference in Accra from 2 to 4 February 2005, support for the Fund is growing. On 3 July 2004, the Executive Council of the African Union (AU) called upon member states ‘to support the Digital Solidarity Fund and its effective implementation’. [1]
In contrast, Northern countries, including the European Union, are much less receptive to the idea. In a recent communication to the WSIS Bureau, the EU expressed its opinion that ‘it is yet to be convinced as to the need for the creation of a separate Digital Solidarity Fund’. [2] At the third EU-AU ministerial meeting in Addis Ababa, 2-3 December 2004, when African ministers requested their European colleagues to provide support for the Fund, the EU delegation merely ‘took note of the request’.
Instead, the US and the EU argue that funding for the information society in the South should be sought through existing financing mechanisms, not by creating new funds. As exemplified by President Bush’s Digital Freedom Initiative (DFI), many developed countries prefer market-based financing - i.e. through the promotion of private sector investment. This position is backed by the private sector, represented at the Summit through the Coordinating Committee of Business Interlocutors (CCBI). For their part, participating civil society organizations (CSOs) have stated that ‘existing and new financing measures should be envisaged and appraised’, including the DSF, provided that it ‘clearly states its goals, is transparently managed, and aims to foster primarily public services, especially for populations living in underserved and isolated areas’.
In the end, the UNDP was requested to set up a task force to study existing financing mechanisms and to consider innovative ways of financing ICTs for development. This Task Force on Financial Mechanisms (TFFM) was formally launched on 4 October 2004 in New York. Chaired by UNDP Administrator Mark Malloch Brown, and consisting of 13 government delegates and 11 representatives of multilateral organizations, CSOs and the private sector, the TFFM will prepare a report to be submitted to the WSIS PrepCom2 in Geneva in February this year.
[1] Preliminary EU Views on the Preparatory Process for the Tunis Phase of the Summit (EU-2004-0527, short version), 28 May 2004.
[2] African Union communiqué: Africa-Europe Dialogue, third meeting of the Troikas, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 4 December 2004.
ICT Update | WSIS Links
Published on 03 January 2005 by RISQ
© M.H.J. van den Berg | www.risq.org
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