With over 1000 participants from over 50 countries, the activities of the « Forum Tic For All+3 » started, on Wednesday November 26th in Hammamet. The objective of the forum is to continue investment development, increasing the Tunisian enterprise capacities in the area of information and communication technologies. An important chapter in this forum will be devoted to the means likely to enhance export capacities of the Tunisian enterprises in promising sectors related to the information and communication technologies sector. This forum, 3rd anniversary of the World Information Science Summit (WISS Tunis 2005), is a follow up programme for the post-summit realization and will host many events over the three days, as follow up and evaluation activities as well as the achievements within the fixed objectives.
Ministers in charge of ICT and international institutions, experts, international business leaders, business banks, investors and many consultancies will take part. The ICT For all Tunis+3 forum was jointly organized by the ministry of Technology and Communication and the Union of Tunisian Industry, Commerce and Handicraft –UTICA was also attended by international institutions working for the development of the business climate in terms of information and commuication technologies, such as the United Nations Conference for Commerce and Development (UNCCD), the Union for International Telecommunication (UIT), the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), as well as the African Development Bank (ADB), the World Bank (WB) and the World Arab Society for Intellectual Property. In addition to investment and finance issues which will take an important part in the forum activities, the participants will deal with an issue which reveals to be crucial and which is the content of the Internet, with the major topic the « High Debit, Industry of Content for Development ».
The content: the major issue in 2008 edition
For the Malian Hamadou Touré, Secretary General of the International Union for Telecommunication «the current recession period shows the importance of the communication technology industry, the content in this context reveals to be crucial in terms of the facilities that it can provide to exchange on the Internet, as well as its capacities of job creation». The importance of the content topic, then, seems to be consistent with the current context of the Summit. The topic will be debated from different angles. For example the national strategies in terms of content will be debated during a ministerial panel gathering the African ministers in charge of ICT, the discussions will be focused on the high debit development of the digital content in the continent countries. The activities around the content as major topic will continue during all the forum with meetings related to reducing the digital invoice, the challenges and stakes of the high debit, the relation between the very high debit for the enterprises and investment promotion as well as the ICT development projects, in addition to the dilemma of the high debit and its mobile services in front of increasingly innovating business models, the opportunities they offer and their best practices.
Business is always present
In addition to the meetings and panels offering the opportunity to leaders and researchers to discuss the problem of the content and the best practices liable to reduce the digital invoice, especially in the African countries, the Forum will also be an opportunity for the enterprises active in this area to visit spaces organised for the matter in the Médina of Hammamet. An off shore village is organised aiming at promoting Tunisia as an outsourcing destination. A technological exhibition is also organised in margin of the Forum with the participation of about 70 Tunisian and foreign enterprises which are active in the field of computing programmes and information and communication technologies, the objective is to introduce innovative applications and solutions to the participating countries, mainly the African and Mediterranean ones. The Forum will also be an opportunity for the organization of information and study days. For example an information day is organized by Intel Corporation, another study day will be organised by the Centre of Studies and Research in Telecommunication (CERT) and the Korean Agency for International Co-operation. The participants from Arab countries will take the opportunities to meet and debate around the realization of ICT development strategies in a workshop dealing with «technological progress for content development, challenges for the Arab world».
