Last month's event, "Broad and Equitable Access to the Internet," drew more than 130 participants, including senior managers from national regulatory authorities, policy makers and government representatives, along with leading figures from civil society and the technical community in Africa.
A report on the event is now available on the ISOC Web site, highlighting the major discussions and linking to all the event agenda.
"It was widely recognized throughout the event that the Internet requires a multistakeholder development model in order to foster access, innovation and growth," explained Frédéric Donck, ISOC's director of public policy. "There is certainly growing awareness that support of the Internet model should be a top priority for policy makers and regulators at the highest level."
"There are many highly respected 'champions' of the Internet at national and regional levels in Africa," added Donck. "ISOC's activities are intended to build cooperation with these champions, strengthen their relationships, and catalyze action at regional level, especially in high level policy forums such as the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the African Union."
One of ISOC's fundamental principles is that the Internet can improve the lives of people everywhere and that, therefore, Internet development is a significant enabler for economic and social development.
"With the 'Broad and Equitable Access to the Internet' agenda, ISOC set out to achieve two objectives," said Dawit Bekele, ISOC's regional bureau manager for Africa. "First, we wanted to address the regulatory challenges that African policy makers face in this new era of Internet and telecommunication infrastructure development, particularly in current African developments in wireless access, submarine cables and universal service requirements."
"Second, we wanted to bring together the people who can leverage both the political commitments and technical expertise to address these issues," Bekele explained.
Events such as the "Broad and Equitable Access to the Internet" are expected to trigger high-level policy discussions on the issues that African heads of states, ministers, regulators and other policy makers have identified as important for Internet development on the continent. These discussions will develop the dialogue from other forums and, through ongoing regional dialogue, will help progress the preparations for the African Heads of States summit that will focus on ICTs, planned to be held in Addis Ababa in 2010.
