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ITU Global Symposium Calls for Promoting Skills in Digital Agenda

The symposium emphasized the importance of capacity building and skills development as an integral component of the digital agenda.
The symposium emphasized the importance of capacity building and skills development as an integral component of the digital agenda.

The 2018 International Telecommunication Union’s Global ICT Capacity Building Symposium, or CBS-2018, took place June 18-20 in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, with a special focus on “Developing Skills for the Digital Economy and Society”.

Participants explored how emerging trends in the field of information and communication technologies have changed human resource skills requirements for the digital economy and society, and the impacts of this on capacity building initiatives, ITU website reported.

They acknowledged that ICTs need to be integrated into national policies and in the implementation of development projects and activities and emphasized the importance of capacity building and skills development as an integral component of the digital agenda.

“Our increasingly digital world offers exciting new employment and entrepreneurial opportunities worldwide,” said ITU Secretary-General Houlin Zhao. “CBS-2018 provided a unique platform from which global decision-makers could explore the evolving human resource skills and knowledge necessary to harness the full potential of these opportunities—so that everyone, everywhere can benefit from these.”

The Dominican Republic highlighted their own ambitious Republica Digital strategy designed to prepare Dominicans, notably younger generations, for a “competitive” digital world. The importance across Latin America for people with the skills to develop online content in the languages and according to the identity, characteristics and needs of the region was also recognized.

“It is our collective responsibility to transform the workers of today into the workforce of tomorrow through institutional and human capacity building,” said Brahima Sanou, director of ITU’s Telecommunication Development Bureau.

“In doing so, we will ensure that no one is left behind by technological advances and we will put the human being at the center of the technological evolution. We will make technology work for people, by putting a human face to ICTs,” he said.

  Capacity Development

The symposium is the main global event for capacity development in the field of ICTs. CBS-2018 was organized by ITU and hosted by the Dominican Institute of Telecommunications.

CBS-2018 brought together ministers, regulatory authority heads, United Nations experts, company CEOs, representatives from universities and research institutions, and ICT capacity building specialists.

The symposium included discussions and debates on:

- skills requirements for the digital transformation

- policy implications for achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in a digital world

- role of academic institutions

- challenges and opportunities faced by least developed countries, LDCs, SIDS and LLDCs and implications for capacity development

- entrepreneurship and innovations in the digital era.

The second issue of the Capacity Building in a Changing ICT Environment publication was presented at CBS-2018. It features contributions from international experts on the subject of skills development in a digital era. Its articles contribute to the ongoing discussions on how emerging technologies are transforming job markets, determining how new skills set requirements and drive the digital economy.

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