OneWorld.net (U.S.)

OneWorld South Asia (OWSA) co-organised a three-day Regional ICT Policy consultation in Dhaka, Bangladesh from January 5-7, 2005, in collaboration with Bangladesh Friendship Education Society, (BFES) and Association for Progressive Communications (APC).

Over 60 participants representing the government, civil society, private sector, academia and the media from the South Asian region, attended the consultation. The key participants included Syed Marhgub Murshed, Chairman on the Bangladesh Telecom Regulatory Commission, Mr. Reaz Rahman, Advisor, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Govt. of Bangladesh and Md. Sarwar Alam, President, BASIS, (Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services) OWSA had invited experts from Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka and India, besides Bangladesh, to provide country perspectives on the National ICT Policy Issues. These include Mr. S.N Gupta, Advisor TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India); Mr Shahid Ansari, Comsats Institute of Information, Technology, Islamabad Pakistan; Mr Mridul Chowdhury, eGovernance consultant, Govt. of Bangladesh; Mr. Vivek Rana, General Secretary, and Computer Association of Nepal and Dr. Gihan Dias, Advisor, Technical Architecture and Standards, ICT Agency, Sri Lanka.

The consultation had two outcomes: I. A set of recommendations on WSIS, from South Asia, to be submitted to the upcoming SAARC summit in Dhaka and other relevant international forums.

II. A set of action points for ICT Policy intervention in South Asia in general and Bangladesh in particular.

It is proposed that the first set of recommendations would be submitted to the SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) Secretariat for inclusion in the agenda item in the upcoming SAARC summit in Dhaka.

With this civil-society led initiative, it is hoped that the ICT Policy initiatives in South Asia would get a development boost and the role of multi-stakeholders, in drawing up people-sensitive policies would be recognized at the national, regional and global levels.

Resolutions of Dhaka WSIS consultations

After extensive discussion on ICT policy by participants from the government, civil society, private sector, academia and the media from the South Asian region, the WSIS Consultation meeting held in Dhaka, Bangladesh from 5-7 January 2005 under the auspices of the Bangladesh Friendship Education Society (BFES) and the Bangladesh Working Group on WSIS (in collaboration with APC and One World South Asia) resolves as follows: The following issues should be drawn to the attention of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) at their next meeting: (1) That SAARC undertake a study on the establishment of a regional Internet exchange to connect the national Internet exchanges to contain regional traffic within South Asia in order to promote equitable regional trade in services and save on the cost of international connectivity and thereby enhance regional cooperation; (2) That SAARC consider the establishment of a regional registry for IP address allocations (SANIC) to ensure that IP addresses are fairly distributed in South Asia; (3) That SAARC recommend that South Asian member states develop a common approach to the issue of Internet Governance and Financial Mechanisms for ICTD during the second phase of the World Summit on the Information Society which culminates in Tunis in November 2005; (4) That as part of this common approach to WSIS, consideration be given to the transformation of ICANN into a multi-stakeholder body accountable to the global community; (5) That expanding access to ICTs in South Asia in terms of the WSIS Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action is a global public good that enhances the value of global information networks and hence benefits everyone including developed countries. A Global Fund for ICTD should, therefore, be established to support the goal of increasing access to ICTs by 2015 and this should be recommended by South Asian member states at the WSIS Prepcom 2 in February 2005; (6) That SAARC should take inputs from South Asian member states, the private sector and civil society to formulate a regional e-strategy to implement the WSIS Plan of Action in South Asia as a whole; (7) That the regional e-strategy should adopt a regional public goods approach to financing ICTD which would explore the relationship between creating a development-oriented policy environment and the exploitation of existing and prospective financial mechanisms to enable ICTs for the achievement of the MDGs and poverty reduction targets in the region; (8) That SAARC should encourage multi-stakeholder participation by member states, the private sector and civil society in the UNDP/APDIP WSIS consultation process on Internet Governance as a way of raising awareness of the importance of Internet policy and governance in South Asia; (9) That SAARC should undertake specific programmes for mainstreaming ICTs in poverty alleviation strategies and achieving the MDGs through the integration of efforts undertaken by governments, the private sector and civil society in the region; (10) That SAARC should support initiatives to promote local content and languages on ICTs in South Asia; (11) That SAARC should seriously consider ways of integrating gender equality into ICT policy issues at the regional level;

(12) That serious consideration should be given to the licensing of community radio stations by member states as a key component of an early warning system in response to the Tsunami tragedy in the region as well as community radio's role in enabling development. Consideration should be given to best practices in community radio in the region such as those in Nepal; (13) That the regional e-strategy should consider the problems of implementation of ICT policy in the region and develop an approach to ensuring successful implementation of ICT policy at country level;

(14) That SAARC should establish and fund a Regional ICT Forum to undertake these above-mentioned tasks and involve stakeholders from the private sector and civil society in the process.

Bangladesh and South Asia ICT Policy Recommendations

A. Bangladesh ICT Policy Recommendations:

1. There is need to review the existing ICT Policy of Bangladesh in view of the current ICT and development needs and ground realities pointed out by the stakeholders. 1.1 This policy review will suggest how issues of gender, teledensity vs. tele-access, creation of relevant and local content and small and micro enterprise promotion would be included in this review and submitted to the Bangladesh government. 1.2 This is based on the premise that the ICT Policy is open to review.

1.3 There is need for ownership of the process by a lead agency. So D-net’s E-policy Center, will take the lead here, in consultation with other stakeholders from the civil society, media and private sector. These include BFES, BASIS, Katalyst, CPD, Bytes for All, BNNRC, Voices, PROSHIKA, Computer Barta, The Daily News, and others. 1.4 Other stakeholders (such as, Grameen Communications, Bangladesh Computer Council, ISP Association in Bangladesh, Bangladesh Working Group on WSIS etc.) should also be invited to join this exercise.

1.5 This group should use open source mailing list groups for running the list (in order to promote free/open source). B. South Asian Policy Recommendations:

2. There should be a common portal, linking the websites on National ICT Policies, for South Asia to facilitate sharing and exchange of information on national policies and discussions/steps on action for possible changes. 2.1 APC will provide support and coordination to the individual country chapters, led by civil society groups to develop these national ICT Policy websites. 2.2 In Bangladesh, BFES, D.Net, Bytes for All, BASIS and Katalyst to coordinate under BFES for the development of this portal. (APC Action Apps software can be used for developing the ICT policy portal in Bangladesh).

3. There is need to set up a regional Internet exchange, depending on the response from the regional initiative already on to start this process.

3.1 Representative of ICTA, Sri Lanka, Dr Gihan Dias, to take the lead in coordinating this with the agency, already coordinating the setting up of the Regional Internet Exchange for Synergising this effort. 3.2 Possibility of setting up such an Internet exchange beyond South Asia and including South East Asia, Middle East or East Asia would also be explored in due course. 4. A working group to be set up for South Asian countries to take forward proposals from this consultation and coordinate other emerging policy issues as well. This agency could act as a South Asian Watchdog agency on regional issues pertaining to WSIS.

4.1 This working group would be extended to include other CSOs and stakeholders than those present in this consultation.

4.2 A formulating group, comprising of Katalyst, BFES, Bytes for All, BASIS, D.net to work on setting up this Working Group in Bangladesh.

4.3 Government agencies (such as, BTRC, SICT etc.) should be invited to join the Working Group. 4.4 Mainstream media should also be invited. Active support of Media to highlight drawbacks of the policy issues and role of civil society in recommendation will be sought.

Dhaka, Bangladesh January 7, 2005