By TECHNOLOGY TIMES Reporter
Lagos. May 30, 2013: Nigeria will this month host the inaugural edition of the Africa Information and Communication Technologies Alliance (AfICTA), a major collaborative event planned to connect key ICT leadersm across the continet to brainstorm and drive fulfillment of the promise of the digital age in Africa.
Lanre Ajayi, Local Organising Committee Chairman of AfICTS and President Association of Telecom Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) says that the event will focus on ICT leaders in public and private sectors brought about in collaboration with the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Number (ICANN), Nigeria’s Ministry of Communication Technology, Nigeria Internet Registration Association (NIRA), Internet Exchange Point of Nigeria, Edo State Government, National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP) and among others.
Member nations of AfICTA include Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, Egypt, Tunisia, the Gambia, Rwanda, Namibia, Somalia and Burundi.
The event is scheduled to take place at the Digital Bridge Institute, Oshodi, Lagos on June 26-28, 2013 under the theme, “Fulfilling the Promise of the Digital Age in Africa.”
According to Ajayi, “”Africa is poised to cheetahpolevault its development for a 21st Century African Renaissance”, when viewed against its population of over one billion people and GDP in excess of $2 trillion growth going by 2012 estimates that puts the growth rate at more than 5 per cent as well as a huge natural base.
“As the private sector led voice of the Continent’s ICT industry and in line with its vision towards the fulfillment of the promise of the digital age for everyone in Africa, AfICTA is convening this Summit to connect key ICT leaders in the public and private sectors across Africa to brainstorm and thus engender the fulfillment of the promise of the digital age in Africa”, the LOC Chairman adds.
He says that the promise of the digital age is as articulated in the Geneva Convention 2003 and the Tunis Agenda 2005 of the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) for an Information Society by 2015.
Organisers of the event hope to provoke thoughts on a global society that reaps the full benefits of ICT and bring dividends of improved living standard, wealth and prosperity for citizens.
The 3-day Summit is geared to addressing the roadmap for a digital Africa. The first day would be Business leaders Outreach Programme by the Business Constituency of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and DNSSEC awareness/adoption Workshop to be conducted by ICANN Security and Stability Task Force. The DNS Workshop will run concurrently with other events on Day 2 & 3 solely for Network engineers.
The opening ceremony, keynotes and initial plenaries hold on Day 2.
Day 3 will focus on efforts to stem high rate of (ICT) project failures with the conduct of a global best practice and specialized Workshop on Procurement and Project Management.
As a way of recognizing African ICT Champions, a dinner will be hosted to honour African ICT Champions selected based on public input. Online nominations have been open on www.aficts.info
AfICTA was formed to create awareness and improve African digital literacy by 50 per cent in collaboration with stakeholders by the year 2020.
It is also focused on creating partnerships with the regional economic Commissions towards the realization of the WSIS 2015 targets.
Part of its key goal is to position more than 50 per cent of African ICT professionals and experts in the business community, academic and technical community and civil society to be fully engaged in the global Internet Governance multi-stakeholder dialogues by 2015.
Its other goals include:
* To be the focal point for Africa ICT advocacy in the global digital economy
* To promote business partnership between member associations
* To organise non-state ICT actors in Africa for effective local and continental advocacy by the year 2015;
To contribute to capacity and capability building by promoting best practices, encouraging regional projects, sharing data, skills, expertise, events, business announcements, exhibitions and seminars, among others.
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