–Min. Hughes tells ICT stakeholders at launch of inaugural ‘Internet Week’

MINISTER of Public Telecommunications, Catherine Hughes said it best Monday when she captured the spirit in which the event was organised in just one sentence.

“What we’ve recognised is that we’re all in these silos, doing our thing, and so the ministry wants to bring everybody together,” she said.

The occasion was the launch of “Internet Week”, the very first time such an event would ever be held here with the aim of bringing together all the local players under one roof to brainstorm how they could work collectively, yet still maintain their individuality.

Aptly themed, ‘Building the Internet collectively!’ as the minister so wittily implied, the week-long event is being hosted by the Ministry of Public Telecommunications (MoPT), in collaboration with several regional and international organisations.

As it was explained at the launch, the foregoing collaboration was necessary not only for the development of the local ICT sector by increasing the level of Internet penetration, but to also remedy the disparity in Internet access here in Guyana, as can be seen in the “digital divide” that seemingly favours coastal over hinterland residents.

Said collaboration was also deemed necessary to promote ICT solutions across all sectors such as education, entrepreneurship, health and agriculture, and understanding and improving the foundation of how the Internet works.

Among regional and international organisations that responded favourably to the invitation to be a part of the event are:
The Latin America and Caribbean Internet Addresses Registry (LACNIC); the Caribbean Network Operators Group (CaribNOG); the Internet Society (ISOC); the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN); and the Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU).

The representatives of these organisations, during brief introductory statements, reiterated the minister’s call for collaboration and capacity-building through learning and engaging.

Meanwhile, Ministerial Advisor to the Minister of Telecommunications, Mr Lance Hinds posited that while the Internet plays a virtually omnipresent role in everyday life, many Guyanese are not aware of the policies and mechanisms governing the “back-end” of the process.
This back-end of which he speaks, Mr Hinds explained, involves Internet security, integrity and maintenance.

“If we’re going to participate in that Internet space,” he said, “it is critical that we understand how that works; how that’s governed.”
And given the mandate to foster social and economic growth through this ICT sector, he said, it is imperative to be part of all the conversations regarding policy creation for Internet governance.
But unfortunately, he said, that is easier said than done, as Guyana, like many other regional nations, are left out of these conversations entirely.

A case in point, he said, was the decision that if Guyana wants to have ‘.guyana’ as a domain name, it would cost us around $10M.

“Now I make this case,” Hinds said, “because that price was arrived at without any intervention or conversation with us; we simply weren’t in the room when the decision was being made to charge that type of money.”

As such, the objectives of this week are to learn and share the policies and mechanisms of governance so that Guyanese would be able to participate in these decision-making forums.

In keeping with this focus, Senior Stakeholder Engagement Manager for the Caribbean, ICANN’s Albert Daniels, related to the Guyana Chronicle that one of his presentations will be made on the processes for policy development.

Overall, the event, which ends Friday, will focus on cyber-security, digital responsibility, internet governance and internet resource management.