Officials from the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat spent February 3 and 4 at the National ICT Center dialoguing with officials from the public and private sectors and civil society on the draft Regional ICT4D (Development) Strategy Plan which is a five year policy document.
The Secretariat’s Senior Project Officer for ICT Development Jennifer Britton, told participants that the document dubbed the Regional Digital Development Strategy was crafted by the Regional ICT Steering Committee along with consultant Dr. Camilla Rhone. Ms. Britton added that the current tour of member states is designed primarily to familiarize citizens with the plans and to get a sense of the situation in each country.
“We hope in the course of our visit to hear a lot more about what St. Kitts and Nevis is doing. The hopes, aspirations and the challenges and even the best practices with regards to ICT and how you’ve infused it into your own development agenda so that we can share with the other member states as we go forward,” she said.
Minister of Information Technology Honourable Glenn Phillip welcomed the visit of Ms. Britton and Dr. Rhone and noted that his Government has been aggressively pursuing ICT initiatives in order to capitalize on the emerging opportunities.
“We are cognizant of the fact that we are living in the age of the information revolution where focus is on the growing role of information technology on the economic, social and technological lives of our people,” he said, while highlighting the advancements in the public and private sectors over the past decades.
Minister Phillip added that Government is always pleased to partner with the CARICOM Secretariat to “articulate and implement harmonized ICT strategies that will improve efficiencies in the education of the [populace] as well as increased output in the economy that will result in sustained levels of diversification and competitiveness.”
The touring officials will have similar sessions in other member territories, the next being Trinidad and Tobago, and hope to conclude the discussions by mid-March. The information will help to reshape the draft strategy which will then be tabled at the next CARICOM meeting of Ministers responsible for ICT.
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Quelle/Source: SKNVibes, 04.02.2011
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