The following are the outputs of the real-time captioning taken during the Eleventh Annual Meeting of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Jalisco, Mexico, from 5 to 9 December 2016. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid to understanding the proceedings at the event, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
***
>> VICTOR LAGUNES: Good morning to you all.
I'm Victor Lagunes from the Host Country. Welcome.
We're going to start in 5 minutes.
We have an Agenda. There is a paper Agenda. If you don't have it, you can ask one of the organizers on the floor.
Thank you.
For those of you who have no had translation devices, for protocol, you listen in Spanish. ‑‑ for those that need interpretation services, please.
Marilyn, dear organizer, can I start?
Good morning, everyone. Be welcomed to our first main session of the Internet Governance Forum. I would like to thank you for your attendance and I would like to thank the members of the head table for their participation. I would like to thank the organizers of this session, Marilyn Cade and others. I would like to thank all participants from MAG, the United Nations organization and I would like to introduce a co‑Moderators, Benedicto Fonseca from Brazil, Karen McCabe, our special guest, Lenni Montiel, Assistant Secretary‑General for Economic Development, UNDESA, the Chair of the multistakeholder party advisory group, Daniel Sepulveda.
Dear friends and colleagues, this session is being broadcasted on the Internet and we have also participants joining us through WEBEX to allow online participation. This session will evaluate assessing the role of Internet Governance in the Sustainable Development Goals in order to advance the Sustainable Development Goals in the 2030 U.N. development Agenda. This is where we're going to framework questions. I hope you're in the right group. Otherwise, contact Marilyn.
Mexico has played a more relevant role, of course, this is a topic that we are addressing in our country, the debate is growing. The different groups that are part of the ecosystem are reaching out to each other, the debate has been candid and this is a kind of debate that we didn't have two, three years ago. This conversation has seen progress with different organization, Civil Society groups, with the Academia and with the corporate sector related to Internet Governance. We already had a Regional Governance Forum, of course we support the progress in the framework of ECLAC and, of course, from three years now we express our interest to host the Internet Governance Forum and we support the renewal of the mandate in December, 2015.
Our interest is clear: To strengthen our activities locally but also we're interested in working into the long run, that is to support a multistakeholder environment. With that, I would like to welcome all of you, and I would like to give the floor to Ambassador Benedicto Fonseca. Thank you very much.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you very much to all of you.
It is ‑‑ I'm very pleased and honored to serve as the co‑moderator for this session. Brazil is a firm supporter and enthusiastic supporter of actions that really prove Internet Governance ecosystem and know that we're firmly attached to the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals. We have been very active and we certainly are looking to total implementation of the technology mechanism in that regard. It is with great pleasure to see that in this session the synergies between both processes will be investigated. We think this is a timely, important task. As we walk through the SDGs, through the perspective of how this relates to Internet Governance and can work in a mutually reinforcing way, we wish to convey to the meeting which all of us a very productive session and I'll turn to my co‑moderator to provide some explanation on how this session will unfold.
Just for the sake of transcription, I just want to clarify the spelling of my name is with an O at the end. Just for the sake of the transcription. Thank you.
>> KAREN McCABE: Good morning, everyone. I'm with IEEE and it is an honor to be a co‑moderator of this session. We're an association with 4 had 2 it technical communities underneath it which is really the strength of the organization. More so, our mission is to advance technology for the benefit of humanity.
With that, the Sustainable Development Goals and our progress toward them are so aligned with that mission. And again, for that reason it is such a pleasure and honor to be here today and to partake in this significant session that we're having.
This is a comoderated, open consultation session. It is to gain input on assessing the role of Internet Governance in the Sustainable Development Goals. I have the pleasure of trying to explain how this all is going to work and the flow of this session.
A reminder, it was mentioned previously, this session is being live streamed and videotaped. It is being recorded, as I noted. We do have remote participants and we have a remote moderator that will be making sure that if they have any comments or questions that will come our way.
We're going to initiate the session with, first, a setting of the scene to provide a variety of perspectives on the topic, and each speaker has 4, 5 minutes to provide those perspectives. Then we'll move into the open consultation or the interactive segment where we'll have, if you will, three subsegments under that to address the Sustainable Development Goals specifically. One subsegment will be on SDG 1 through 8, the second on SDG 9 through 15 and the last one ‑‑ sorry, 9 through 16 and the last segment on Sustainable Development goal 17.
We're going to organize the open consultation segment by stakeholder community group. I know when you were entering the room our volunteers from IGF were organizing you to sit in some respective areas. On this side over here, my hand is over here, to my right, my left, your right, it's the Business community. Here we're sharing Civil Society and Academia, to the right, your left, Government community. We'll ask each speaker to keep your intervention to about 3 minutes. We want to make sure that all people who have comments have an opportunity to do such and we'll be rotating them through business, Civil Society, Academia, IGO, Technical Community and we'll go around again. As you see, this is a bit of a challenging venue for this type of activity. We ‑‑ thanks to the IGF volunteers we'll have microphones and we get to each section and we'll ask you to raise your hand if you want to make an intervention and the microphone will come to you and then you'll have an opportunity to do that. Also as a reminder, I can't stress it enough, it is being videotaped and we do ask also that you make sure that you announce your name and affiliation so that we can capture that as well.
With that, I think we're going to launch into the setting of the scene from the different perspectives ‑‑ pardon me. I missed a critical piece.
We have comments.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Before we turn to the setting the scene segment I would offer the floor to His Excellency Lenni Montiel, Assistant Secretary‑General for Economic Development, UNDESA. You have the floor, sir.
>> LENNI MONTIEL: Thank you, Chair.
Good morning, Excellencies, Distinguished Delegates, ladies and gentlemen it is a great pleasure for me to be with you at this first main session of the Internet Governance Forum 2016. The 11th IGF on enabling inclusive and sustainable growth is the first in its 20‑year mandate renewal. As you can imagine, as a U.N. official representing the Secretary‑General here in Mexico I cannot think of a better topic to kick off the discussion than the topic of this session, Assessing the role of Internet Governance in the Sustainable Development Goals. In September, we celebrated the first anniversary of the adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. It is ambitious aiming to end poverty in all forms everywhere, many targets are aiming for universal access bringing together Agendas that thus far have been addressed on different tracks from Sustainable Development, climate change, peaceful societies, institutions and now they're altogether under one single roof.
The implementation of the 2030 Agenda with its 17 goals and 169 targets began in January this year. Our challenge now is to turn the goals and targets into real and lasting change in people's lives. Our motto is "leaving no one behind." Internet and ICTs is a reason we can be optimistic that we can reach the bold transformations required by the SDGs. Target 9.C of the SDGs calls for significantly increasing access to ICT and providing universal and affordable access to the Internet in Least Developed Countries by 2020. The Internet can help ensure equitable, effective public services for all, particularly for the poorest, most vulnerable. ICTs and Internet bring breakthrough advances for health, education, they can enhance public accountability, they can promote participation for more inclusive societies. They can promote policy integration. We have made remarkable progress in the past 10 years in spreading the benefits of ICTs, these priorities remain both among countries and among people.
Lack of access to technology, poverty, inequality prevent people from fully taking advantage of the potential of Internet. Yesterday only I mentioned that today at the end of 2016 a total of 53% of world's population, and that is 3.9 billion women and men don't have access to the Internet and this is worldwide. In the 48 Least Developed Countries, 12% of world population only around 1 in 7 people will be online by the end of this year. In the majority of the world's poorest countries, broadband remains unaffordable. The global Internet user gender gap is even increasing. Many people cannot use the Internet because they lack the necessary skill or there is insufficient content in their native language. There is many things, unreliable wire supply, coverage cost, access in digital literacy, local content, capacity building. To overcome the challenges as stated in the WSIS+10 we need to ask ourself for example what is the critical next steps, all stakeholders should take if we're to reach the target of universal access to the Internet and to close digital divides? We need to think of bold new steps to rally all actors to put the Internet in the service of the poor, women, disabled people, Indigenous populations. There is much we can achieve with the best brains of the ICT industry and society working to make affordable Internet access available. We are invited to reflect on these efforts.
In closing, I would like to thank the organizers of this session and all colleagues that contributed to extensive preparation. Last but not least, I would like to stress the United Nations continues committed to support the work of the IGF.
Thank you very much.
[Applause]
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
With that, we'll head to setting the scene to provide different perspectives from our esteemed speakers. With that I would like to introduce Megan Richards, Principal Advisor in DG Communications Networks, Content and Technology, CONNECT, of the European Union.
>> MEGAN RICHARDS: Thank you.
It is a pleasure to be in Mexico and particularly because this is the first IGF of the new mandate. I'm very pleased to be here.
I will try to speak briefly about some of the initiatives we're taking in Europe, and how those have implications for the rest of the world and how Internet Governance can be brought into that context.
In Europe we have a huge activity going on to try to improve and establish a digital single market. This digital single market addresses many of the goals of the Sustainable Development Goals, and we're trying to use information and communication technologies and the information based innovation and research to make sure that those goals are addressed in an efficient, sustainable and ecologically ethical way.
Why is the digital singular market making any sense to any of you? Why should you be interested? It is to make Europe a better trading partner, a better global citizen and to have better access and exchanges with the world. That's the first point I wanted to make.
The second, Europe, the European Union in particularly is the primary aid donor in the world. We have been over the last few years trying to integrate digital technologies in our development assistance program and in the last few weeks we have now even clearer commitments from our council administers and from communication by the European Commission on how to achieve integration of digital technologies in our development assistance program. When Europe provides development assistance, it works very closely with the recipient countries, a program is developed and those programs, of course, are bottom‑up, driven by the recipients but we want to make sure that the digital technology elements of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals are integrated into those activities as well.
Of course, the Sustainable Development Goals are not just about developing countries, they are the whole world's obligation and we all are committed to achieving them. We have to make sure that all our partners and all stakeholders work together to do this. The model of Internet Governance is a very good one we can use to extend and expand to the application of the Sustainable Development Goals.
The other aspect I wanted to mention, of course, is that in this context, in ensuring that we have ‑‑ that we achieve these goals we have to make sure an enabling environment is available not just in the developing countries but throughout the world. Here we can also work very actively together. Since the Internet underpins all of the digital technologies we have to make sure that it remains robust, secure, stable, we work to ensure that the benefits we have all seen and achieved over the last 20 years of the existence of the Internet continues into the future.
One aspect I would suggest as an idea, perhaps the U.N. along with all of us in this room and beyond could help to map even better the way in which Internet Governance multistakeholder approaches could be used to help us all to obtain the Sustainable Development Goals. This is something where we could all work together to identify where we need to do a bit more, where there are lackings, overlaps potentially making our work even more efficient and useful.
I'll stop there in the interest of time.
Thank you very much.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: It is my pleasure now to introduce my friend and colleague, Daniel Sepulveda, Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs, U.S. State Department.
You have the floor, sir.
>> DANIEL SEPULVEDA: I thank you, Victor, the co‑Moderators.
The U.S. believes the Internet and multistakeholder model of governance are natural partners for the fulfillment of the Sustainable Development Goals. We believe that because the fulfillment of those goals will have to lean heavily on public‑private partnerships, it will need to welcome the commitments and expertise of non‑governmental stakeholders and will need to encourage the participation of all people, including those most impacted by the decisions we make as a whole. Really this is the only way to ensure that the Sustainable Development Goals are reachable, no single sector will be able to achieve them alone.
Just as the 2030 Agenda is moving from commitments to action so should our community, the Internet community ensure that we remain committed to action, not just international agreements and discussion. Reaffirmation of the multistakeholder model by the U.N. General Assembly in the WSIS+10 last year and the stewardship transition this year were to our minds historic achievements. We must now ensure that those and the many other Internet Governance processes meet the process of transparency and accountability where more stakeholders from the developing world have a seat at the table, where we focus on advancing a global Internet and lowing the digital divides that remain within countries and in between countries including the gender divide and where we as a community remain unwavering in our commitment to the protection of Human Rights. We appreciate the work within the MAG and by the community this year to ensure that the IGF lives up to this standard and it is essential that the work continues over the coming decade. The multistakeholder model of Internet Governance has facilitated significant accomplishments over the past decade and we should appreciate these by promoting expansion of access to the Internet and digital tools for the development that they contain. This access and these tools directly support the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Decreasing the number of people living on less than $1.25 a day by a third.
The second goal, zero hunger, smart agriculture, using satellite monitoring network sensors and Internet enabled automation has the potential to increase crop yields and bio sensors will make healthcare accessible and affordable giving an additional 1.6 billion people access to healthcare by 2030. Almost all of the goals have examples like these where you can walk through and point out specifically using specific statistics on how connectivity and the tools they provide will help us reach those goals. The digital divide persists as I said earlier between and within countries across many categories including between the wealthy and those lacking resources, gender lines, in between urban and rural communities, we know that the ICTs are a key enabler to closing the gap to achieve the economic growth, gender balance, social inclusion and are deeply committed to feeling that meeting those goals, the United States is prepared to do its part to join with others to increase access to ICTs and broadband connectivity across the world because increasing that access will affect the fulfillment of the 17 SDGs. We believe that connecting people to the global network and ensuring they have the skills and the freedom to use connectivity productively is our highest mission. We also cannot afford to deny that the challenge is disproportionately real for women and disenfranchised communities. Governments will not solve these problems alone or solve them by centralizing direction and control. We live in an age where the key ingredients for innovation and growth are cooperation and collaboration. Together we can fulfill the goals and this community has a unique role and opportunities to help fulfill the goals. Thank you very much.
[Applause]
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
Next I would like to please introduce Doreen Bogdan, Chief Strategic Planning and Membership Department, International Telecommunications.
>> DOREEN BOGDAN: Thank you very much.
Excellencies, distinguished colleagues, ladies and gentlemen, good morning.
The 17 goals of the 2030 Agenda provide 17 challenges for the global community but it also provides 17 tremendous opportunities, 17 opportunities to succeed by channeling the enabling transformational power of ICTs.
The 20 it 30 Agenda for Sustainable Development clearly recognizes that global connectivity holds great potential for human progress. That catalytic power of ICTs for the achievement of each of these goals will not be fulfilled until we have universal and affordable access to ICTs and the Internet. As the U.N. Secretary‑General special adviser on SDGs said to the ITU council, if we fail to address the digital divide the 2030 Agenda will not succeed. Every one of the goals provides a compelling region to achieve universal affordable connectivity and there is a clear, tactical roadmap within the Sustainable Development Goals Agenda that compels us to do so and is our guiding way. If we can create effective multistakeholder partnerships as we're called to do so in goal 17 we will succeed in achieving all of the specific ICT targets, targets which have been agreed to by both the developed and developing world. We need to especially focus on goal 9.C, universal, affordable access to the Internet for Least Developed Countries by 2020 ‑‑ not 2030, but by 2020. While this goal may be aspirational, it is not impossible with the right mix of human will, strategic multistakeholder partnerships and technological innovation.
I wanted to tell you this morning 17 real stories on how connectivity is enabling the SDGs, but as I don't have enough time, I'll limit myself to just a few:
Goal one, ending poverty ‑‑ Edema lives in Mali and he's financially included thanks to his 2G phone and he receives regular messages from the agricultural information service and he's able to stay up to date on the latest market data and knows the best time to harvest and sell his crops.
Goal 2, zero hunger: Leboni is one of thousands of smarter farmers in Bangladesh. When she calls 16123, a free call, from any operator in Bangladesh, she gets access to realtime agricultural information and knowledge helping her to farm smarter and increase productivity on her smart holding.
Goal 3, health and well‑being: Naki's 2G phone is helping her to take care of her unborn child. Mobile phones are ensuring that Naki and thousands of pregnant women all over Ghana get healthcare for themselves and for their new babies. That's something that we heard yesterday from another about the initiative in Mexico helping pregnant women and new mothers.
A junior school in Nigeria, education: Thanks to the eLearning classroom, which is fully equipped with a laptop, Internet modem, projector and screen her and classmates get access to quality education resources from around the world and today as we know, there are 60 million children of primary school age that are not attending school and we know that there are 26 million teachers that are needed out there and we believe that ICTs can fill that gap.
Goal 5, gender: Angelica was a street sweeper and now she's a web entrepreneur. She's one of more than previously unskilled women who have been benefiting from the ITU and telecenter.org Digital Literacy Campaign.
On goal 5 at the ITU, we're happy to see there are hundreds of initiatives out there that are focusing on ensuring equal participation of women and girls in digital technologies. The gap is still there and we need to do more, and that's why the ITU together with U.N. Women have launched a multistakeholder initiative called Equals, which is a global partnership for bridging the digital gender divide and we invite you to join us Friday morning for our open session.
As Vint Cerf noted yesterday, we have unfinished business to do. Unfinished business to connect the unconnected. We need to join forces to get the business done.
I will close by reiterating a message that David Navarro conveyed to the 2016 council session of the ITU, the new development Agenda is universal, indivisible, and must leave no one behind. We must address the digital divide or we will not succeed. We don't have a plan B for the future.
Thank you very much.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments.
I will now turn to Mr. Patrick Ho Chi Ping, Deputy Chair and Secretary General of China Energy Fund Committee.
>> PATRICK HO CHI PING: Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, the rapid development of ICT in recent decades has ushered us into the fourth industrial revolution. Our lives and societies are increasingly interwoven by a single man‑made system, the Internet. This new system has brought about much good but has presented new challenges. As with revolutions past, we are now seeing rising tension between those advancing the new technology and those being left behind by it. Today a growing digital divide is exacerbating inequality, Steveing dialogue and ‑‑ stifling dialogue and leading to discourse, 3.9 million people lack regular access to the Internet or have none at all. The tragedy of this is that the digital connection offers a distinct opportunity to those it has left behind. Basic needs are met, assessed to the ‑‑ access to the Internet can expand horizons to provide the need for people to lift themselves out of poverty. In recognition of all of these facts, the world's nations have said under SDG 9 a target providing Least Developed Countries with universal, affordable access to the Internet by 2020. The construction and expansion of the Internet infrastructure including fiber optic lines, routers, DNS route services are critical to achieving the target. Current estimates show that the world will need at least 10 trillion‑dollars in investment for the ICT infrastructure by 2030. In the meantime, we see chronic under investment with gaps of hundreds of billions of dollars in the infrastructure. Until we're able to secure increased commitment to expanding Internet infrastructure our efforts to bridge the divide will be slow and at worst largely stuck in mud.
Fortunately there are promising signs of some countries rising to the challenge. Infrastructure development including Internet infrastructure is one of the key elements of China's initiative and it is an initiative whose core concept is to provide regional connectivity and bridge all kinds of divides. Indeed, China is already working hard to secure the investment and partnerships necessary for the success of the digital roads. No nation, organization, section of Civil Society can succeed alone in bridging the divide. Everyone must contribute. More should participate in the road or immolate the model of cross‑border development and work to strengthen the investment in Internet infrastructure. We should renew our call for infrastructure development for the Internet making known the advantage of doing so, jobs and economic opportunities, improved access to education and services and social empowerment. All of the things that can be unleashed by having more people online. Lastly, we should always remember that new technologies, however remarkable they may seem are fundamentally tools made by people for people. Innovation and technology must put people first, only this way can they truly propel us to what's more sustainable growth and inclusive development.
Thank you very much.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you so much. I would like to introduce David Souter, Managing Director, ACT Development Associates.
>> DAVID SOUTER: Thank you very much.
I would like to take a slightly different starting point from other members of the panel and pick up on the last point that was made by the previous speaker, which is putting people first, not technology. I will try to make six points in my 4 or 5 minutes.
Derived from 25 years of prying to work at the interface between development and the Information Society and to bring them together. They're both very important areas, areas really important for the future but there are real challenges in bringing them together.
The first point, we have to acknowledge there is a paradigm gap between the Internet and Sustainable Development you can see this I think in the very limited presence of the Internet. In the outcome document from the 2012 Earth Summit and the relatively slight emphasis it gains in the Sustainable Development Goals and Agenda. The fact is, I know this from working in the field, many practitioners are not persuaded yet that the Internet is as important for development as many of us think it is here. That's been the case for 10, 15, 20 years. I think we need to recognize it more, it is a challenge to address. The starting point in addressing this, this is a second point. picking up on what the last speaker said, I think it should be the human development problems that are fundamental to Sustainable Development which are the problems identified in the goals themselves which were on the screen a moment ago.
Those human development problems are rooted in structural issues of economic resources and economic capacity of poverty and inequality, political, in I can power structures ‑‑ economic power structures and the Internet will contribute substantially to addressing them. It can't resolve them on its own, it is a part of the SDG story. I think if we here in the Internet community are going to contribute as substantially as we should we need a deeper understanding of the challenges of development and why they have proved so intractable. Particularly, we need to understand why Least Developed Countries seem to be falling adrift in both development and ICT indicators that are present.
The third point, this is not a static question. The SDGs are set for the next 15 years. The context within which they'll be implemented will change politically, economically, social will I, culturally, environmentally over that time and the technologies we talk about here in ‑‑ we talk about here in 15 years will be different from what we talk about today. The approach to this I think needs to emphasize that the Information Society is a process of change and we need to consider the adaptiveness of societies to our technologies. Fourth, this is my largest point, there are three main areas where ICTs, the Internet will be significant for Sustainable Development. The first of these which I think is most important but which tends to be emphasized less, it concerns underlying changes happening in economy, societies and cultures as a result of the Internet. Systematic changes in how societies and economies work and how things are done by governments, businesses, citizens.
These are very important today and they're growing in importance and they'll have a profound effect in the next 15 years. The second areas of projects and programs which make use of the Internet to support development goals where experience is in IED and the evidence suggests that those that build on this practice, they're more likely to be successful here. The third is about the monitoring, measurement of development outcomes, there are high hopes for big data and challenges in ensuring that big data analysis doesn't over emphasize the impacts on those that generate most data rather than those who are in most need.
Of the three areas, I think it is the systematic impacts that are likely to be most important. Fifth, I think we need to learn more from what's been happening. This year's world development report from the world bank is the most comprehensive assessment we have of the digital dividends and they're positive of the role of Internet in facilitating the development but points out two things, those with money, resources, capabilities are better placed to gain from the Internet than those that don't. It feels that the ‑‑ the bank feels that in many countries the Internet has disproportionately benefited elites and it sets out clearly that the potential of ICT has not been realized over the last decade at the pace that had been hoped and we need to understand more, we need more analysis on why that is so.
Finally, my last point, I think the best way for us to start addressing this going forward from here is STOs listen more to those that work in development. Here I have a suggestion, if we repeat this session next year and a panel of experts on the Internet I suggest we have a panel of development practitioners, people whose expertise is in poverty reduction, gender equality, health, education, others, asking them to help us to respond to the development challenges which they identify as their priorities.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you, David.
That concludes our setting the scene segment of this session.
With that, I'm going to ask our speakers to please take their seats in their respective stakeholder community groups if you will, David, I know you're staying up here with us on the panel because you have the wonderful challenge to sum it all up at the end for us. With that, I will ask the speakers to please take their seats and we'll enter into our open consultation town hall style segment.
While they're doing that, I will remind us, again, of how this is all going to work for us.
We have four stakeholder communities, Business community over here to your right, in center is a combination of Civil Society and Academia, Government and IGOs, this side, the Technical Community. You will see IGF volunteers with signs and pink shirts helping us out to ensure that that is where their respective stakeholder communities are sitting.
As I noted, we'll do three rounds, if you will based on the groupings of the Sustainable Development Goals with group 1, segment 1, Sustainable Development Goals 1 through 8. If you are looking to make an intervention, we ask it is about 3 minutes, we make sure everybody has an opportunity to speak. Please indicate if you are interested in making a comment to raise your hand and our volunteers will get a microphone to you so that you can do that.
We ask if you can introduce yourself and your affiliation, that would be helpful. How we'll work this, it is Benedicto Fonseca and myself, we'll be more moderating, facilitating each of the segments, just to make sure that people are staying on time.
We're going to start with the business community. As I noted earlier, we'll rotate, Business community, Civil Society, Academia, Government, IGOs, Technical Community and then we'll do a round robins.
With that, we would please like to entertain comments from the Business community and if you're interested, raise your hand and a microphone will be provided to you.
Thank you.
I see hand over here ‑‑ or you can stand, that may be easier for the volunteers to see as well.
We're asked that we don't stand in the aisles though for safety reasons.
>> AUDIENCE: Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Dimson, I'm Chair of the concerned private sector group in Africa where we have companies and ICT associations from 27 countries in Africa. We actively engage in the IGF discussions. I want to thank you for what you have done and for giving me more interest. First and foremost, if we're looking at our Internet Governance to Sustainable Development Goals, we need to look at the fundamental principles behind IG which some talked about, the multistakeholder partnership, it is key, especially with developing countries. Last two months we had a Summit and the government through the ICT minister did say that there was a need for policies, guidelines to be reviewed so that they can better address the SDG issues. I think this is a fundamental point, that all of our ‑‑ we need to do a review of policy guidelines, review of regulatory frameworks, review of all the policies that we have so that we can better address the issue of poverty, the issue of hunger in the land and also last Friday based on the multistakeholder partnership we had a Forum where there was a need for more affordability of Internet access. The government wanted to increase the price of data access but because of awareness among those stakeholders, there was a lot of response to that, no, you cannot think of reducing poverty and hunger when you want to increase the cost of access. Government listens, and the rate is this. We need to engage more with government, they have a role to play. In Africa, if the government doesn't move, nothing really moves. We appreciate the number of our governments, they're quite responsive but in private sector in Africa, we also are ready to engage so Sustainable Development goal is key for the Information Society of WSIS. That's the point I would like to make at this session.
Thank you.
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you so much.
Now we would like to take a comment from Civil Society and Academia.
>> STEVE ZELTZER: Thank you. I'm Steve Zeltzer with LaborNet from San Francisco.
I think this Forum is very important for having a debate and discussion about the effect of the Internet and the future of the Internet.
We're concerned about the situation of the marginalization of labor and particularly deregulation, disrupting the economy and particularly in the case of Uber and others, workers are marginalized and you have the gig economy that's effected workers with regular, stable jobs in the United States and around the world. We think this has to be addressed. It is causing a very bad effect for workers in the United States and other countries. Even Uber and the traffic situation in San Francisco, I know a lot of people go to San Francisco, but you have thousands, 20, 30,000 drivers in San Francisco who are part‑time workers basically trying to survive on Uber and it is having a delirious effect.
The other aspect we want to raise, the issue of privatization of the Internet and Facebook. We have a petition around how Facebook is using its position to say they're going to provide free Internet, Internet.org, they have taken over the domain of org and they're using that to market its products around the world. This is a serious threat of the privatization of the Internet. We're in favor of a free, public Internet for working and poor people all over the world. We don't think that the Facebook is interested in that, they have a marketing scheme to do that.
Lastly, I want to issue solidarity. There was an encampment in Guadalajara of the teachers fighting privatization and the use of the Internet in the schools where computers are replacing teachers and the encampment was removed last night in the Guadalajara Liberation Square. That's a concern to us, that the right of the teachers to protect their jobs, protect their seniority and professionalization is heard by people around the world.
I want to thank this assembly for hearing these concerns.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: We will hear now from representative of Government.
I would like to just clarify that those from Business and Civil Society, they have indicated a wish to speak, we'll be back with you in a second round. We do our best to identify those that have already indicated their wish.
I invite representative from Government to offer comments on SDGs 1 to 9 if there are any volunteers from government.
>> WISDOM DONKOR: I thank you. My name is Wisdom Donkor from Ghana, and I work within government.
I have a few observations from the panelists.
In the past we have seen a tremendous groove in capabilities and reach of ICTs. The Internet especially has become a critical enabler of social and economic change, transformation, how business, government, citizens interact and offering ways of addressing new challenges.
What I think is that before we can reach the SDGs we need to consider one or two things. First of all, infrastructure, especially from a developing world, we need to start considering developing our infrastructure, without that, we won't be able to reach the Sustainable Development Goals.
In the next one, we also need to get a mechanism to support government, developing where governments have too many responsibilities and sometimes it takes government away from critical issues like Internet Governance. If you have a special mechanism that can specifically address issues of the Internet infrastructure, that would also help.
We also need to start considering open data. Before we can start accounting for the SDGs we need to open up our data. Government needs to open up data. It is based on this data that we can address the issues of the Internet infrastructure.
This is my contribution.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
Now we would like to see if there is a volunteer from the Technical Community to make intervention.
Please. Thank you.
Thank you for everyone keeping to the 3 minutes. It is very helpful.
Thank you.
>> KYRO TULSANOF: Thank you very much.
I'm Kyro Tulsanof from ISOC.
I would like to bring attention to Central Asia where I come from. Internet is a very important thing for our region in terms of developing SDGs. This region, it is the most vulnerable for accomplishing these goals. You have countries that are landlocked, far located from other countries from the sea, they're high, very high mountains in the region, that makes our region very vulnerable the climate change, it is ‑‑ the fluctuations, they're high in the region and there are glaciers providing water for the region are melting.
In terms of contribution to climate change, our carbon emissions are among the lowest in the world and electricity consumption is 95%, it is from renewable sources. Recognizing this vulnerabilities, the countries of Central Asia, they're focusing on developing strategies based on sustainability and knowledge economy and we're right now working on the concept called Smart and I would like to ask for cooperation in terms of know how sharing, knowledge sharing and in terms of the investment to help o you are countries to accomplish Sustainable Development Goals. Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
We'll start back over here with the Business community. Remember, we're discussing Sustainable Development Goals 1 through 8.
Thank you.
>> AUDIENCE: This is Garland McCoy with technology education institute. An input I would like to throw out, having been a part of this for now 10 IGFs, it is the necessity in my mind of expanding to other corporate, global corporate entities that understand already the value that ICTs and Internet have to their global supply chain, their back office and so you don't have to sit down with them and do a long educational piece on the value of the Internet, but can help ‑‑ I think ‑‑ if we bring them in, in the hotels, the Caterpillars, the Boeings, around here we have ‑‑ we take a distillery tour of all of the tequila communities. They have the products displayed over the world for people that love the tequila. They understand the multinational companies, the value of the Internet. If we get them involved as being disciples in helping educate the government officials in why it is important to have broadband access. For this hotel, the Hilton hotel, they'll build on the beach, it is important for the tourists that are going to come in, they want that, the Convention folks want that Internet connection. They'll come, fill the convention hall in the hotel. If we could slowly over the years make that a goal and have them helping us with the Sustainable Development Goals I think that would be a real plus.
[Applause]
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments.
Civil Society, and I would like to recognize the gentleman there on the fourth row that had asked for the floor before.
>> EDUARDO ROJAS: Good morning. My name is Eduardo Rojos. I come from Bolivia.
I would like to consider a previous context, I have worked with the Bolivian government. I have been a part of the Technical Community of Internet Society and currently work with ATC as part of the organized Civil Society. I would like to share a thought with you and this discussion.
Are we talking about Internet Governance or are we going to frame Internet Governance in the governance of the Information Society? This is structural approach, it is paramount, if we target our attention in terms of the tool and technology, are we going to favor a business model, neglecting the human being? I consider important to go back to the basic principles of the world Information Society summit where the human being is at the core. This rhetoric it seems, but it is important because when talking about the governance of the Information Society and not just as a technical tool of the Internet will we redirect the attention to human beings at the core.
Secondly, based on this idea I believe that it is very important that in order to address the Millennium Development Goals, the Sustainable Development Goals, we have to focus on generating an interface to have access to information but between human beings, not between human beings and machines. What I mean, to create an intelligent citizenry, an informed citizenry. The moment human being is neglected from access to change the way he or she interprets the world, we won't be able to change the global reality we live.
Human beings today need more than ever need not to invest in technology only. Human beings on top of investing in technology ‑‑ specifically human beings need to invest in information to change our brains and the human mindset because every time you need more input to make decisions and to become stronger as a human being and as a community, it is a relevant idea to discuss. Are we talking on building an informed citizenry? An intelligent citizenry? The access to information allows citizens to make decisions in a global context.
Thank you very much.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you. Thank you for your remarks.
Basically the idea was to hear inputs more than reactions from the head table. I would like to respond to your questions.
I would like to say in response that the framework that we're addressing and what we're aiming at is to find a correlation between SDGs and Internet Governance, and that falls in the framework as you have mentioned from the output of the World Information Society's Summit, that is how we're framing it from the very point of view how complex it is and from different angles that have been addressed at the Summit. That is to say including ethics, including privacy, including Human Rights, how can we use governance to have a better Internet Governance environment, and how can we contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals?
I would like to say that this is our proposal: We cannot prevent specific interventions to redirect our focus, but what we're trying to favor is a broad view based on WSIS, if that can help address your questions. I'm not sure if I have answered your questions. It is important to note the focus of this discussion.
Thank you very much.
We will go again to the Government stakeholder group. I would like to invite another comment.
You have the floor.
>> ISMAIL SHAH: I'm Ismail Shah, and I'm the Chairman of the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority. We're a regulator of the Telecom sector.
The points I would like to raise are that if you look at the SDGs, the main issue that they're trying to address is poverty and inequality. There are opportunities ‑‑ if you look at the ICTs and Internet specific, it provides opportunities for learning, for getting services, but there are certain steps we need to be aware of, some speakers, in fact, did mention that. One is the exclusion of those people that do not have access to these services. In fact with this, the digital divide may be broader. This is something to look at, how to provide access, not just the access but affordable access and also the relevant education they need to have in order to take advantage of the benefits that the Internet offers.
The second point, I agree with the last speaker on this which is basically collaboration. I agree we need to have people from the development sector here because ICTs, Internet, it can solve some of the problems that they actually are experts in. ICTs if you look at it, they're ‑‑ it is a tool. It is not the end in itself. Basically we need people who are working on these problems related to development and then with ICTs we can solve them.
I would like to relate one of the initiatives we have taken so we're working with the Persons with Disabilities and we have involved them. We ask them, okay, what are the issues you're facing? Then we are trying to find solutions using ICTs for them. If there is an interest, I can give you more information on that.
There is also a need about the general information related to SDGs. Many of the people actually don't even know exactly about the SDGs. We need to have more awareness about SDGs.
The last thing I would like to add for the future of IGF is that we need to have focused session on maybe one or more than one, but a few of the SDGs, have case studies presented in detail and also we need to have a way of measuring progress. How can we measure progress we have achieved using ICTs for those particular SDGs.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
Now we will move to hear an intervention from the Technical Community. Raise your hand if you want to speak.
>> GEORGE SADOWSKY: Thank you.
I'm George Sadowsy associated with ICANN but speaking in my personal capacity.
I want to support as strongly as possible David Souter's suggestion that next year, maybe earlier, that we have people that are development experts addressing us as well us addressing issues of development.
I live in a developed country, most of us do. We know how to do business there, we know how to learn, exploit ICT elements to earn money, to ‑‑ other than more things, to live our lives in more productive ways. We understand our own methods of production of these things. In developing countries, those of us who have worked in them, are often very surprised that the methods by which things get done, the constraints that exist that we don't know about, the opportunities that exist that we don't know about, they are there.
The way in which we can get things done, the way in which we can make progress in many aspects of life in developing countries, it depends on the knowledge of the process of development. People who are development experts have a lot of experience. They are as concerned about progress in economic and social development as we are. They know this field. They are not averse to the use of ICT although some may be a bit awkward and not work with it well. They want to find tools to make their job easier and to allow them to make progress. We need to include them in our thinking and we need to understand what they know that we don't so that we can make joint progress together. I strongly support the suggestion in any way that it can be implemented in any Forum that has to do with ICT for development.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
Before we move back to the Business community I wanted to check in with our remote moderator if there are questions coming in on that front?
I don't think we have any. Remote moderator, are there any comments?
With that, representative please from the Business community.
>> NAVEEN TANON: Thank you.
I'm Naveen Tanon, President of the Association of Telecommunication Efforts out of India.
I have two questions, first on the MAG and function of the IGF. First, it is for the MAG Chair:
We have learned that through the year the IGF also encourages intersessional work at various levels. Some of the work was presented today. Can you give us a full overview of all the intersessional work streams that currently exist or plan to be introduced in the future? How can the broader Internet Governance community engage in contributing to this work?
The second question is for the Secretariat of the IGF, for Chengatai Masango.
The IGF website is improving. Can you describe what's improved over the last few years, what are some of the new features and how can the broader community engage more interactively with the Secretariat and the MAG using the IGF website?
Thank you very much.
>> KAREN McCABE: May I remind everyone, this is supposed to be a consultation period. We're looking at comments, but I'll leave it to the pleasure of the two people that the questions were posed to if they want to respond.
>> MEGAN RICHARDS: I can respond quickly not to disrupt this particular panel.
This after afternoon from 3:00 to 4:00 there is a Setting the Scene session which will cover all of the main sessions. This year, one of the things we're doing, it is much more prominently featuring all intersessional work, Best Practice, Dynamic Coalitions, the work of the NRIs. There are two NRI sessions over the course of the next few days and the same for Dynamic Coalition sessions.
I think, again, just not to disrupt this particular Forum, if people would look through the Agenda they should see very specific workshop slots which would address you to actually explore those in more depth.
With respect to the website improvements, we can find a way to take that offline and get you that information that you're requesting.
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you.
One logistical arrangement, it is a challenge for us as moderators to make sure that we have the right order of speakers that requested the floor. I would like to request some help from Marilyn Cade and Theodore, if you can help us to organize the list of speakers so that we make sure we don't lose people that have asked for the people and in the second round may be overlooked by someone else who is closer to the microphone.
With that comment, I would like to turn to Civil Society, I recognize the gentleman that asked before for the floor.
>> ARTURO SERRANO: Thank you very much.
I'm Arturo Serrano, a researcher in intersectional innovation, development, and ICTs.
I think we have a great opportunity to use ICT for development. We know that. I would like to pose this question of development in the perspective of hope, whose perspective, the vendors, government? I think we're missing the perspective of the people that are going to be developed. They know what exact ‑‑ exactly what to get. I agree with the gentleman with Bolivia, I think we need a framework that helps us to connect more deeply. These aspects of development with the needs of other populations, because I think it is fundamental.
This perspective of development, it has to be really thought of.
Thank you very much.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comment. That's certainly taken onboard.
I turn now to Government.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you. My name is wisdom from Ghana. Assessing IG and SDGs, now what I want to see in the next IGF meeting, we have to begin the measuring of the impact. We have to bring some of the sectors within our communities. Health sector, we have to start bringing them to IGF for them to show us how they're using the Internet and what are some of the challenges that they're facing. We also have the sector that want to solve the eProblems, issues within that sector and we need to start bringing them for them to start ‑‑ for them to tell us what they're using ICT for and if possible maybe the MAG Chair, if possible, IGF can also organize a kind of hackathon for us to bring some of the developers around, provide them with data and let them at least help with some tools that can be used in reaching the SDGs.
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
We have a question ‑‑ we have a gentleman in the front here who has been raising his hand several tiles.
Please.
After this intervention we'll move to the second set of the SDGs and comments on those.
Thank you.
>> XIODONG LEE: Thank you. I'm Xiodong Lee from China Internet information center.
You know that I'm from a country which is the largest Internet population country but the penetration reach of that Internet, it is only a little bit more than 50%, it is 51% ‑‑ it is only 22% more than the average rate of the world Internet population. In China, it is just a small area of the world. We have the modern City of Shanghai and it is more than 7%, and we have a lot of cities in the areas, the penetration, the rate, it is less than 30%. You know, there is a lot of barriers for people to connect to the Internet, for example, the connection rates, the technologies, the cost of the device and also modeling of localized measures. There are a lot of barriers.
It is a very big challenge for China to connect the next 7 hundred million people in the Internet. I know China's government wants to have a big target, one to achieve a billion users in the next two years. It is a big challenge. I encourage the world to work together with China to find the right path to achieve that, you know, if we can solve this problem and find the right way to connect more people in China, we can find the right path for the world to connect the next billions and if we can work together, in the future, the achievement will benefit the world again.
Thank you.
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you, sir.
We have a comment, an intervention from the remote moderator.
>> REMOTE MODERATOR: (No microphone).
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
With that, we'll be moving to a discussion on our second set of SDGs, that's SDG 9 through 16. With that, we'll start with the Business community.
>> MARILYN CADE: Thank you.
I'm Marilyn Cade. We were invited by Benedicto Fonseca to organize this session. Let's explain what we'll do to speed it up.
We're asking in each section to please, if you want to speak in this segment, you're going to raise your hand and hand a business card to your mic person all at one time. If there are 10 of you, 12 of you, 4 of you, we'll know in this session how many will want to speak. Someone will collect this, you raise your hand in the Technical Community and your person will collect your business cards. We'll do that in Government, in the Technical Community, that way then we'll start with the first speaker but you will know, moderators, how many speakers you have and we'll do the count and come back to you after you have done the next round and that will allow us to perhaps help to speed and even to know if we have to go to 2‑minute segments.
If I might, with your permission, segment by segment ‑‑ don't look at me, look at her! If you want to speak, raise your hand and hand her a business card.
Civil Society, you do the same thing ‑‑
>> KAREN McCABE: May I also add, if you have already spoken to please sit a round out so someone who has not spoken can speak out.
>> MARILYN CADE: Igor will collect the government and then we have the Technical Community. If we may take a minute to do that, we'll give the mic to the first business speaker.
>> KAREN McCABE: The mic was off. We weren't hearing you.
>> MARILYN CADE: We can start with the business speaker and then we'll be ready with the Civil Society, and I'm going to start with David Vyorst and we'll go to the Civil Society and then two more Businesses.
>> DAVID VYORST: I'm David Vyorst. I'm the Executive Director of the ISOC, Washington Chapter and the Co‑Chair of the IGF U.S.A. And in my comment, I would like to address how our national initiatives addresses and highlights the SDGs.
The SDGs in Connecting the Next Billion are key values that inform our conference. In 2015 and 2016 we had plenary sessions on Connecting the Next Billion, and in 2015 we had an open consultation on the WSIS+10. Our program is determined through multistakeholder input in the sense that we have open meetings, we collect suggestions and recommendations from our entire community by email and in meetings and then we conduct a curvy to figure out ‑‑ a survey to see what sessions should turn into sessions. The fact that these rank so highly every year and become main sessions show how important these things are to our initiative and our community.
Thank you.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments. According to the rotation, we should turn to Civil Society.
Who is the first speaker for Civil Society, please?
>> MARSHALL ODAYAMA: My name is Marshall Odayama. I'm from Open and Free Networks Movement.
I want to ask two things: How could we build a free and open Internet if the only models is based on the market one?
How can we change the future that Internet is a right and it is an on the shelf product. We think these issues, some issues to think, it is digital cities and community networks building infrastructure with democratic governance through a legal inhibitory model and I would like to have you think and if the moderators have a point.
Thank you.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for the interventions and for the point raised. Those are taken into account, and in case anyone wants to touch on this in their comments they're more than invited.
I will turn to the Government stakeholder group and I look for your guidance, Marilyn, or anyone who is taking care of government who will be the first to speak for that segment. We are focusing on the SDGs 9 to 16, but of course there are some comments that are comprehensive and they fit in any of the segments.
Is there someone from Government?
>> KAREN McCABE: I believe Marilyn said we were moving to the Technical Community and we'll go back.
Please, someone from the Technical Community would like to make an intervention, SDG 9 through 16.
>> MARY DUMAI: My name is Mary Dumai. I have been raising my hand for the first segment of this discussion because that segment so much speaks to my environment, that is the developing country in Africa.
If we're looking at no poverty, zero hunger, healthcare, all of the rest of them, I think what we're discussing here, some of the things that the technology, the solutions can bring to get this, to allow governments and then all stakeholders to achieve this Sustainable Development Goals.
For me, I think that Indigenous technology services, especially the broadband, the broadband services were so much help in achieving so much of the Sustainable Development Goals. We should address broadband even at the local level.
We should also look at local content making sure that what we're developing is relevant to the environment where we're developing it for. Local content and in terms of local content we should also ask, you know, see what we can do to engage those that think that the e of everything, it takes away their jobs, it is a big issue. We had in Nigeria, we held our eNigeria and in this one, from the health sector, it said that they're working and ready to accept new technologies because they feel that it is going to replace them and they'll go out of jobs.
Those are issues that our technologies should address. Reassuring the workforce or the sector that's involved that even if there's new technologies, even if there are innovations that will respond and have the outreach of getting more customized to their sector.
I have a lot to say. I'll stop here because of the time.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
I'm just going to check with Marilyn if we're going back ‑‑
>> MARILYN CADE: We're going to the remote moderator and then to the Government.
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
>> REMOTE PARTICIPATION: A comment made earlier by Deidre Williams from St. Lucia that was happy about the person making a comment about concerning involving Persons with Disability and she would like to get the contact of the person.
Another comment from her, I'm concerned about apparent reluctance to use technology. We talk about it so much simply as a tool to make things happen for whatever reason. There are only three remote participants in this session, at least at the moment. If we who are already convinced don't use the tool how can we expect the next billion to use it?
That's a comment from Deidre Williams, Civil Society from St. Lucia, Indies. Thank you.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for this comment. I think this is actually something we have to think about.
I turn then to Government.
Marilyn, can we be guided on who is the next speaker, please?
>> MARILYN CADE: A question from WEBEX, we'll get the question read out from WEBEX, we'll hear from one government and then to W and start the cycle again.
>>JUAN CHO: Thank you. I'm Juan Cho from the Chinese Service Administration Digital, and I have some comment on the SDGs regarding the innovation.
In fact, innovation is the critical issue for the IG and from the point of China, we have two aspects to have comment.
Firstly, that innovation, itself, the powerful ‑‑ the most powerful driven for the ICT, for the Internet development, innovation will introduce more new technology and a new commercial mode to the Internet itself.
Second, the Internet has become the most important means to promote the over role in the economic development, the China government has launched Internet+Action plan to promote their own development economy, economy development.
Finally I introduce you briefly regarding the Chinese government organized for the world Internet conference meeting. This meeting, it has been held three times and last month it ‑‑ the third meeting was held in Ujjain City, and in fact over 1,600 guests from 110 countries participated in the meeting, and the theme of the meeting is Innovation Driving the internet Development for the Benefit of All. We do want to welcome all the Internet related peoples to join our meeting to discuss innovation as well.
Thank you.
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
I believe we were going to a WEBEX comment?
I don't think we do at this point.
We'll start our cycle and thank you for your patience as we sorted that out.
Now we'll move to the Business Community and again guidance on who the next speaker will be. Thank you.
>> ANDREW MACK: I'm Andrew Mack. I run a consulting firm based in Washington D.C. and a former World Bank person and MSF person. And so all of the discussion around bringing more voices from the development community into this strikes me as a very good thing.
I wanted to touch on something that was alluded to by our colleague in Bolivia and our colleague in Nigeria and others, which is at the root of a lot of what we're seeing, is this issue of employment. Fundamentally, what we're looking at, all of these development goals, they're very much dependent on us having enough resource for our families, our communities, and that really translates in my mind into jobs.
In Africa in the next ten years there will be 124 million new people coming into the workforce, aging into the workforce, 25 million of them just in Nigeria. A thing we need to really focus on if we're serious about the Sustainable Development Goals, it is to focus on ways in which we can structure our conversation not just around the end results, education, health, but on the things that will make those changes sustainable which is jobs for me, jobs for my family, and in that, a future for our children.
Thank you very much.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you.
We'll move to the Civil Society and Academic.
>> HELEN LADRON de GUEVERA: I'm Helen. I'm a past President of the Public Library Section of the Mexico Library Association and an active member of AIFFLA and the Committee of Freedom of Access of Information and Freedom of Expression.
I just want to remind all of us of the humanitarian role of public libraries. We have a golden opportunity to empower Civil Society as the strongest way to move faster towards the Sustainable Development Goals.
The second thought that I have, and I would like to share, is this, this situation exists in many parts of the world like corruption, the lack of transparency, the lack of a good government, all of this situations, it hinders the development of goals to improve the lives of the common citizens and benefits only personal interest.
Please, I think all of us have to be aware of corruption exists in many parts of the world, there is a lack of transparency and not a good governance or open governance in many places of the world.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments.
We'll turn to Government.
>> MARILYN CADE: As we ‑‑ hold on. We have a new volunteer. Go ahead.
We're going to give the mic to government. Sorry we didn't have that volunteer and they're we're going to the Technical Community, if you are the from the government, you haven't given your card, you have to do that now to get a speaking queue.
>> AUDIENCE: I'm from Afghanistan working with the Ministry of Communications and IT.
Talking about SDGs, we were just working on how we can define our actions back in our country. It is quite challenging. When we talk about the goals like zero hunger, I mean, in countries where you're in war and in countries where you're not in war, how could we really define these goals in all countries. The premise differs. The same applies to Internet Governance and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.
Since Internet is one of the crucial enabling elements in achieving some of the Sustainable Development Goals, but when we look back at the developing countries, the affordability, access to these, this enabling tool, it is indeed a huge challenge.
If we look back, at least three years back, one megabit of Internet costed us around $1200 U.S. a month. Today we're somewhere between 115 and 200 U.S. per megabit per month. How can we really reach to our farmers in order to benefit from Internet in order to achieve the goals set by the Sustainable Development Goals?
I would say we should focus on how to really make Internet affordable in those parts of the region. Instead of making Internet a commercial business or commercial profiting element, why not Internet be considered as enabling the businesses, not only to be the mainstream of business.
Thank you.
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
We're moving to the Technical Community. Please, thank you.
>> PAUL WILSON: Hello. I'm Paul Wilson. We're the IP registry for the Asia‑Pacific,
Goal 9, infrastructure, particularly on the need to build human capacity in the development and provision of Internet infrastructure and services around the world. This has a huge significance in the context of IGF because of the critical dependency on the Internet that we all assume here.
We're lucky in developed markets to take things for granted, Internet speed, reliability and ongoing improvement, but we tend to transfer that attitude in development activities which support the ICT and Internet development but in fact these things cannot be taken for granted in any market whether developed or developing. The difference between a stable, chief, affordable, secure Internet service and one which is none of these things can be simply a matter of the human skills and capacities which are put ‑‑ brought to bear in properly designing and operating the services. We can assume with qualification that the availability of the skills in developed markets but definitely not in developing markets.
This isn't ‑‑ this may not be unique, of course, to Internet infrastructure, but I mention it specifically here because this is what the IGF is about, and because also even here I see an assumption that Internet services sort of happen for free ‑‑ for instance, after undersea cables may have been installed to link a particular country ‑‑ as I say, they don't have happen for free or automatically.
I want to urge attention to the human factor in development of Internet services over the top of cables, other infrastructures deployed at the moment. A recent study which we had funded showed that in the case of Pacific cable connections it is possible to show in many, many cases the Internet traffic between two countries does not flow over those cable connections. The reason for this, it is simply human skills and capacities to properly manage those network connections.
Just want to mention the Technical Community, as part of the multistakeholder Internet community has performed a role, a really big role over many years, in fact, in assisting education, training, professional development and particularly through non‑profit structures such as network operated groups, non‑profit conferences, development fellowships, so on. My organization, we work with others including the Internet society, the Network Data Resource Center and many others in providing training, technical assistance to those that need that support to provide secure, stable, cheap, affordable Internet services. These are not commercial or sales activities, this is non‑profit neutral Forums, part of a multistakeholder environment that supports Internet development, not just Internet Governance. I felt this deserves a mention here in this session, particularly in connection with goal number 9.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you. So we're keeping a watch on the clock as well.
We're going to be moving for one more round on this group of SDGs, 9 through 16 and moving over to the business community.
>> SOPHIE TOMLISON: I'm Sophie Tomlison, and I represent the International Chamber of Commerce, Business Action to Support the Information Society.
If you don't mind, I would like to go back to the other set of SDGs because I would like to focus on one specific one: SDG 3, ensure healthy lives and improve well‑being for all ages.
I think when people think about emerging technologies such as Internet of Things, digital Internet sometimes we're wrapped up in developed world issues like automatic cars and intelligent fridges, but it is important particularly at IGF to consider how sensors and the Internet can be leveraged to provide technological solutions for societal benefits in all countries at all levels of development and provide concrete examples for discussions like this.
Solutions in developing countries, they're enabling quality and affordable healthcare for middle and low income segments of society. For example, computers in the Internet, they can be used to take photos of symptoms or injuries and send back to doctors and hospitals in cities. This saves time and also avoids the patient having to travel. ICTs can also be used to supply energies to hospitals when reliable energy, electricity, it is a problem in rural areas so that the power shipping containers can be used as cyber cafes, I think when we consider these concrete examples, it highlights why we should encourage commercially accelerate the innovation and adoption of ICTs and have flexible, long‑term Outlooks when it comes to approaching strategies to harness the emerging technology. Echoing points raised in the session, a multistakeholder but a cross sectorial approach in the different stakeholder groups is really important so that policy making and regulations don't create an intended consequence but really makes sure that the societal benefits of technology is beneficial and inclusive for all.
Thank you.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments.
We'll turn and hear from a representative of Civil Society or academic.
>> MARILYN CADE: We have four more certain societies, we'll do two back to back, anyone from government that's volunteering and then we'll come back to do the last two Civil Society and we're wrapped for the segment and we'll collect the speakers and prioritize for the next section. Two certain societies back to back, then we'll invite government, if anyone raises their hand, come back to the last two Civil Society.
>> AUDIENCE: Good morning, everyone. I'm from the Consumer Association and I'm ‑‑ I also am a representative in Internet Committee, Steering Committee in Brazil, and I'm speaking in my own capacity.
I just want to agree with the important proposal made in the table, to make a study in order to identify the relevant multistakeholder models, to encourage countries to adopt it and to strengthen the good models that are already underway, especially to avoid the Internet Governance it is driving by markets and government's interest. I think it is important work in order to give effectivity to goal 16, effective institutions and also to guarantee values like universal and democratic access to Internet and to knowledge. I think this work can be made here in this context of IGF, but in the context of the NETmundial that has a goal the universalization and multistakeholder development in those models to the Internet Governance.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> AUDIENCE: (No English translation).
‑‑ it is very important. I believe that it is a very important challenge. We're aware that half of the people tends to access the Internet and the other half can't have access to the Internet. We have to find out a way to help the other half. It is very important to identify how are we going to connect both hands, our right hand with our left hand.
After the Internet Forum an expert issued a report, therefore I would like to make a comment related to such report. I believe that if we're to talk about development countries should be aware of the important role they play. There can't be digital divides in order to fulfill the 2030 Agenda. We believe communicating every single space is important. Diversity should be placed at the core.
We should be more careful in terms of addressing international relations and having set international standards. That is what we would envision for our international co‑existence, that is very important as well as Civil Society and government institutions, they must participate in order to promote Sustainable Development and Internet Governance.
We are fully aware that the Internet is extremely important for all of us. More and more countries are playing a crucial role. We're here to promote digital‑based communication and the peaceful development will result in Sustainable Development for the world. We hope that all of you can contribute to Internet development.
Thank you very much.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments.
I understand now we turn to Government in case there is a volunteer from Government. Anyone?
Peter, you have the floor.
>> PETER MAJOR: I try to intervene as acting Chair of the Commission of Science and Technology for Development, and I want to congratulate the panel and all the participants that took the floor to remind us the WSIS original goal, it was a people‑centered, people‑oriented Information Society. It has been announced by Patrick who has already left and then said by David and by many of you coming from developed or developing countries that this is the importance of the whole exercise.
Keeping that in mind, keeping in mind the name of the commission I'm Chairing, that is Commission of Science, Technology for Development, I think science should also mean social science, and I will encourage the Commission in its future work to concentrate on this issue.
We have heard concerns about the employment, about the perception of the technology development, and we can understand the concerns which have been expressed. So I will really concentrate on this part of the science to make clear to all of us how to proceed in Internet Governance and how to make use of the results we have achieved in the multistakeholder model in the Internet Governance.
Since I have the floor, I would like to point out that right now in the Commission we have a multistakeholder Working Group, which is being Chaired by our moderator, Ambassador Fonseca, and I'm proud of that achievement which is second in half to the improvements of the IGF itself. I'm pleased to see that the recommendations which have been given by this Working Group are being implemented, are regularly being implemented and this session is also a good example of that.
To conclude, I will go back to Geneva and encourage the Commission in its coming intersessional meeting in January to concentrate on the issues that have been brought up here and to proceed in this sense.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: We'll move to Technical Community.
Any representative that would like to speak?
>> LIYUN HAN: Thank you. I'm Liyun Han from China Internet Information Center.
I would like to express my appreciation for the great efforts to achieve the SDGs in the next 20, 30 years. I think different countries and the regions have to face the different situations so maybe the next step we have to do is to find out the different Best Practice and to share them and allow more and more to find out the best way to conquer the problems.
I would like to share some information from China's side, in this August I traveled to many poorest cities in China and did some field research there. I found out that in the local cities they try to figure out the different ways to support the poverty relief such as they built up the eCommerce park for the poorest people and to teach them how to use the ePlatform to sell their local foods, local products and what impressed me mostly, is that there is a disabled people but he can use the eCommerce platform to sell their local foods and earn maximum at 8,000 for each month. I think maybe ‑‑ and the government, the government provides many privilege policies to enhance the park. More and more people benefits from these methods.
I think in the world there must be many best ways to lend to us to find out them. That's what I mean.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
Civil Society.
>> AUDIENCE: I'm Alexander lutz, I'm interning and I'll be speaking in my personal capacity.
I'm excited to be here. I wanted to ‑‑ I think technology a lot today, jobs, we're at the core of achieving the SDGs and we have to keep in mind that technologies today will bring a lot that can change lives for the better, it is amazing, it means that it will replace many jobs in the future, in the very close future which is not a bad thing, not all jobs are great so it is more positive, we have to think about it and it also means you will have to rethink the way we ‑‑ we have this concept of labor, the way we want to design the labor force and what we'll do when a large segment of the labor market will not be needed anymore. This brings us to alternatives, universal income that's been talked about several times and it is really important that we begin to have this discussion. I guess it is great to have these opportunities in these Forums to bring people from all communities, businesses, governments, Civil Society to begin to think of those alternatives because the changes are coming fast and we have to act now.
Thank you very much for being here today.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you.
We should turn now to the last segment and focus specifically on SDG 17, on partnerships for the goals.
What I would like to suggest, that we could take some final comments from the audience and had then we'll turn to the Rapporteur. I think all of us would want to listen to a systematic appraisal of the session and move forward, we would like to hear from the audience those that have been here and we'll move to the Rapporteur immediately.
I turn to you, Marilyn Cade, to guide us on the last speakers from the audience.
>> MARILYN CADE: I'm going to recommend 2‑minute statements due to times. We have a number of Civil Society speakers in queue. We ask you to raise your hand on the Business side, someone will take a card, a 2‑minute time slot and we have already I think three, four from Civil Society and then we'll collect business cards on the government side, please, if you're going to speak as Government you don't have a card, please write your name, government, we need to collect those and then Technical Community and we should be able to go 2 minutes and go quickly and make sure we get everybody, wrap up, stay on time.
We start now, if you want to speak on the business side raise your hand, somebody will get you are ‑‑ we have a hand, we'll get started. Here, if you haven't given her a card, a piece of paper, do so, Government side, somebody will do that, technical side, we'll start and get you the rest of the count.
>> JINSON OLUFUYE: Thank you. I'm Jinson Olufuye, Chair of AFICTA.
We're talking about partnership this is the core of the matter. At international community it has been clearly established that internationally they support SDG. This position needs to be made at the national level. It is very important, there are three decision options which we have followed wholeheartedly or just approaching it minimally, or we'll do nothing. Every nation, you need to make that decision that we're buying into the SDG, it is very important.
I make a decision that if you buy into it, you have to take active, practical steps, for example ask for open government across all sectors. The last week when we discussed at the Forum, we found out that many research outputs that could enhance governance, that could enhance job creation, they're just lying there, nobody knows about them! There has to be a better publication of outputs at the academic and research level, better publication of activities at the government level, open government initiatives. It is very, very important.
We need to drive the message home at the sovereign national level, and I'm happy to say again that Nigeria started this in Nigeria, IGF, second edition. At the local level, a regional, subnational level, you have all stakeholders coming together to address local issues.
It is a partnership in the local level. And I give a practical example of what's happened when we had this summit last two months in October in Namibia. Here we have the private sector that has funding to deploy into the remote areas. You know we're very vast, so we need to get the government to buy in and to do that. It is challenging. That's an opportunity for government and private sector to come together, that Forum, the conversation, it is ongoing. In many cases, funding in the hands of private sector, but if the government, the stakeholders, they're not available, you cannot flow. It has to be fundamental decision that nations need to make that they buy into the SDGs and the time to make it happen.
Lastly, there has to be monitoring and evaluation. It has to be continuous monitoring, evaluation to know where we are so that we can achieve the result. The key thing, partnership and partnership guarantees the success of all SDGs from the first to the 16th.
Thank you.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments.
Now we listen to the last interventions from Civil Society representatives back to back all those that have been inscribed.
>> LORANGO SALACE: I'm Lorango Salace. I come from a state in Mexico
In order to reduce digital divide we must implement in each family ‑‑ I mean, train each family ‑‑ I'm sorry. I'll say again.
Each family needs to instill the values of the Internet because the Internet impacts your mindset, your society, your pocket. Not many people ‑‑ not many people have the skills. Parents do not have the skill, many people do not have the skills to implement the use of Internet and teach their children how to use the Internet.
In each neighborhood people trained on the use of Internet should be present.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you very much. Thank you for your intervention.
We'll take the last statement to Civil Society, Technical, Government, and we'll wrap up and listen to the Rapporteur.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you.
I just wanted to raise a concern. This is a U.N. organized event and I'm afraid that there are still so many, too many countries around the world who aren't U.N. members and too much isolated from this process. I would call on organizers to put a mechanism in place so that each country can be called up on to talk to these issues we're discussing here. If not to be accountable, because the Sustainable Development Goals are a United Nations adopted document so they're supposed to be connected to that I believe. What we're discussing here in the corner of Internet Governance regarding those goals needs to be brought up to every one of those countries so that what we are wishing for here can be implemented or can be at least ‑‑ we can register some progress on the ground.
The reason why I say this, too many ‑‑ in too many countries particularly in Africa, Internet is still treated like a luxury good. You will find countries where still to have basic access to the Internet, people have to spend three times, four times, five times their minimum wage to have access to the Internet. You are not going to have significant progress on development goals in countries where people have to spend four times their minimum wage to access the Internet. I would like to see some progress made in those countries as well. I'm calling on the U.N. to put the follow‑up mechanism in place so that those countries can be called open to speak to these issues.
Just last year in some country ‑‑ I'm not going to give names ‑‑ the Minister of ICT, didn't know what IGF is about. That Minister has been in place for at least four years. After ten years of IGF some ministers still don't know what IGF is. I think we need to make sure that whenever we come to this Forum to discuss ‑‑ I know we're not a decision‑making body ‑‑ but once there is consensus emerging around some issues or some decision to be made, wherever it needs to be made, those countries, each one of those countries, not in multilateral, multistakeholder arenas like this, with general talking points, but each one of those countries has to be called upon and ask them what ‑‑ if they're making any progress on this and this point that we agreed on.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you.
Yes.
>> MARILYN CADE: You can speak for one minute each. Earlier they didn't respond to my invitation, but we persuaded them, right? Then we have a Technical Community speaker for 2 minutes and we have a final Civil Society limited to two minutes and then we're done.
>> WISDOM DONKOR: Thank you.
I'm Wisdom Donkor. Quickly, to bring up from Nigeria, I want to give a case of Ghana.
Within the telecom sector, the concentration is mostly based within the urban cities, forgetting that we have the rural areas. What the Government of Ghana did was to try to lay the fiber infrastructure across the whole country connecting all government agencies and inviting government, business to come on board. We have been able to achieve that successfully. The business areas, the business sector, the telcos are now willing to exchange Internet, broadband in all services to the rural communities.
I think infrastructure is very important. With that we can also solve the employment issues, also solve the inequality issues and all that. We need infrastructure as well.
[Applause].
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you.
According to the list it was established by Marilyn, we turn to the other speakers, please.
Go ahead.
You have the floor, please. Go ahead.
>> AUDIENCE: Hello. I'm from Austria.
I would like to underline that we could offer Best Practice example, establishing a multistakeholder mechanism where we're discussing policy, accomplishing, what we plan and envisage to make Sustainable Development become a reality and all of the information is public on the Internet. And I would be happy to discuss with you afterwards or in between your break so I could help to assist to, for example, to provide a similar mechanism in your country.
Thank you very much.
>> KAREN McCABE: We're going to Technical Community. Thank you.
>> AUDIENCE: Good morning.
I Chair a young Civil Society Organization from Cuba, the Union of IT Experts from Cuba and Professionals from the ITC sector. We have another two opportunities in this Forum to speak up, but we wanted to share two statements that we have claimed and tried to advocate from our young organization which is 7‑months old in order to fulfill the 2030 Agenda with human beings at the core as it has been discussed.
I would like to state that, first and foremost, the information society is still an exclusive concept in many corners in the world, and most of the planets inhabitants are marginalized from these breakthroughs such an impact that benefits the use of technologies, it is not providing benefit to developing countries. It is very important not only to speak about this topic, but to work jointly in order to have full access to network by enabling an educational, ethical, objective, useful and truthful use of technologies, making sure that cultural input is provided, cultural input that's diverse reflecting our cultural diversity.
We must eliminate all of the roadblocks that developing countries face in order to adopt new technologies. Therefore, it is important to act upon and discuss technological transfer‑related topics, and for that purpose it is very important to advance international cooperation from organization. This is areas that we cover.
Secondly, we want to reaffirm as a Civil Society organization paragraph 48 of the Geneva principles describing the international management of the Internet should be a multilateral one, should be transparent and democratic and with the full participation of governments, private sector, Civil Society, international organizations.
In this process we must guarantee the equitable allocation of resources to enable access of every single one and to guarantee a safe, stable use of the Internet and to consider as well multilingualism. In this respect, we would like to ask support, and this is what we advocate for from our organization by creating groups and networks that propose Best Practices and best policies.
Thank you very much.
[Applause].
>> PATRICK HO: I'm Patrick Ho from China.
I would like to speak on behalf of the users of the Internet.
The users represent the largest group for the SDG 17 probably for now and the future. ICT, it is the virtual space technology: In the physical space we have regulations and social modes; and the virtual space, we're also exploring the different ways that we can govern it. So there's very little consensus in the virtual space, instead there are a multitude of views of how the Internet should be governed reflecting our world's great diversity of culture, tradition, religion, moralities, views on topics such as sex, gambling, religious jokes, ethnic slurs.
Language varies greatly from location to location. National governments have generally worked to represent their user base, but a large part of Internet Governance remains in the hands of private companies and other non‑state actors who are the stakeholders because they control some of the very critical parts of the Internet infrastructures.
Every day users in the meantime are left with best vague notions of how the Internet is regulated and governed. The use of the Internet is largely superficial, typing a few words, point, click, rather than of routines and servers and protocols and data streamings. This lack of transparency left Internet users with little choice and even less say and aware of the serious stakes at play over issues of privacy, security, freedom of speech. The engagement, education, empowerment of users should be a fundamental objective of the IGF especially national and regional IGFs. We must strive to implement a more democratic governance and secure a prominent role for every day users and the non‑users who will become tomorrow's users.
Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: I think we are finished with that.
We want to thank everyone for their comments and interventions. This time we're going to be handing it over to David who will do the amazing job of summarizing all of that for us.
Thank you.
>> DAVID SOUTER: I'll try.
I can't cover everything. I'll try to cover many of the issues raised. I won't recap the opening discussions, but focus on what was said in the open sessions.
I'll begin with just a ‑‑ we'll talk about the aims of the session: It was to assess the role of Internet Governance in the SDGs and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals which was broader.
I think one of the questions that raised, it was evident in the discussions, whether we were talking about Internet Governance or the Internet in relation to Sustainable Development, on the whole I would say the discussion brought together two very complex issues which have long histories and which have not been linked closely together in the minds of the participants in either, but it is an important task to bring them together in order to maximize success in both to enable the ICT sector, the Internet, to make its maximum contribution to Sustainable Development and to build Sustainable Development within the way we move forward as an Information Society.
Peter reminded us that there is ‑‑ that the core theme of the World Summit was in fact this integration between the Information Society and the Development Agenda. It came up in the introductory comments from the Assistant Secretary‑General of UN DESA talking about the state of play, the challenges that are faced in the U.N. systems and among partners in ensuring the SDGs and no one is left behind.
A lot of discussions around ICTs in particular, an achieving universal access as a part of achieving the SDGs as a whole, not just as the specific SDG target 9.C which refers to it. Secondly, integrating digital technology into the implementation of development, the integration word being really important, and also reiterated by a number of speakers, the notion that ICT is a tool, not an end. That, of course, is referenced directly in the WSIS Geneva declaration and human beings, they're at the core of development, the development challenge we face, they're considerable but at the heart of them are people, people‑centered, inclusive, development‑oriented Information Society. Again, it is the starting phrase of the World Summit Geneva Declaration.
The development challenges, it is considerable, including a very wide range of things in those 17 SDGs.
Another point I would make about this, emphasized about one speaker, context, one speaker, perhaps several, context, it is that if we're looking at development challenges we need to look at them in the terms of the individual countries and not just see one large mass of development, either a mass of developing countries or a set of particular issues. We need to look at the specifics of the particular country concerned and the particular sector in that country.
Turning to specific issues, actually not much was said about individual SDGs. Most of the discussion took a cross‑cutting view of the role of ICTs in development and I think there is a justification for that which was raised which is that ‑‑ it is that cross‑cutting approach that maximizes the value that can be leveraged. However, I would refer to some speakers referencing in particular the SDGs on poverty and equality and also on health and perhaps also on eCommerce as it can be used by small producers.
In terms of the thematic approach, there was a discussion about access to information, access to in knowledge and the development of understanding which will enable people to make better decisions in their own interests.
At the same time, there was discussion of the challenges, challenges were raised, the Internet can pose problems as well as opportunities particularly the discussion of the marginalization of labor and the implications for employment of fewer job casualization and so forth. The important question raised by one contributor, I think the employment perspective of sustainability which certainly I think gives us more thinking about.
Ways forward finally: So obviously access is a fundamental importance. There was a lot of discussion of that in terms of connectivity, including references to marginalized areas and to broadband. There was also reference to other dimensions of access which are now routinely considered alongside connectivity, affordability, content including local content.
There was less reference until very near the end to capabilities which was interesting. If this was a development community Forum there would be much, much more emphasis on the capabilities and skills of people to make use of the Internet. There was also reference to the need for skills and capabilities to relate to the stability and security of the Internet itself.
So different aspects to access, it was discussed. I mention infrastructure, the enabling environment for investment and innovation. Other things that I think were talked about, making the most use of resources about the digital age that enables digitalization, more generally, open data, open government. There was discussion by a few people of the need to develop ways of measuring progress on the SDGs, as such on the impact of ICTs, not quite the same thing. Indeed for continuous monitoring, the scale of the SDG challenge for national, statistical systems, it is very great.
Also the need to share research and evidence more widely. In the IGF people refer to the multistakeholder approach, the value of which lies in enabling the better development of consensus and the development of better decisions. But also I think within that, one speaker referred to the importance of supporting governments in their roles.
Another aspect of this would be dialogue with the development community, so I raise that myself, a number of other people raised the importance of having a dialogue with the development community. A multistakeholder approach must involve that reaching out to and listening to those who have expertise in other areas. And a healthy reminder at the end of the importance of the user and role of the IGF in enhancing awareness and understanding of Internet Governance.
Three, I think final future work for the IGF, having people from the development community as a panel here ‑‑ I suggested that, so maybe I shouldn't suggest it again, but it was raised from the floor. References to intersessional work and Best Practice fora in the particular context of this. The role of national IGFs in responding to the Sustainable Development Goals.
I think those are a few things that the MAG could consider.
>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you.
I would like to also offer some final remarks.
After having listened to all those who took the floor and also to our Rapporteur, I am totally convinced of the importance of the conversation we have just had on the synergies and the possible links between the Internet Governance and Sustainable Development Goals, however my take on this is that since I anticipate this will be a permanent feature in IGF meetings in between now and in the horizon of the implementation of the SDGs I think it would be very important in future occasions to shape the discussions in a way that will allow us to have conversation that will lead to some kind of ‑‑ if I can use the word, tangible output, the language that was used by the Working Group on the IGF improvements that made a specific recommendation that the IGFs really should seek to produce tangible outputs that could be Fed into other processes. This is exactly what we need. As David Souter stated at the very beginning, it is very important that those involved with the SDGs Agenda with the implementation of the SDGs, they are made aware of the contribution that the IGF can make through the multistakeholder discussion and the investigation of so many issues related to Internet Governance that can have an impact on what they're doing there. I think it is very important that in the future occasions, and I would like to congratulate Marilyn Cade and Igor for the idea of having that conversation but it is important in the future occasion we shape our meeting in a bay that we can produce some ‑‑ in a way that we can produce very concrete, at least some ideas and recommendations and proposals for those who will be implemented and those that will be actually ‑‑ the countries represented here through the main stakeholders as one of the contributors have mentioned, we should make sure that all the countries are also involved in this effort in a way they are through different mechanisms, through different participations. I think it is mostly our task to make sure that we have made that bridge between what we discussed here between what the conclusions and the richness of the debate we have here as a very concrete contribution to implementation of Sustainable Development Goals. The call for this was already made last year and by the adoption of the SDGs and this year when ‑‑ that the high-level panel met, made a specific call for the contribution coming from science and technology sector, then certainly one very particular sub sector to be related to ICTs and Internet. I'm totally convinced of the value of the discussions that we hold in this Forum can bring to the overall discussion on the SDGs.
With these words, I would like to say I'm very glad with the discussion we have had and I look forward to future developments with more action‑oriented or more focused approach to enable us to reach that goal.
Thank you.
>> KAREN McCABE: Thank you.
[Applause].
>> KAREN McCABE: I do want to echo the Ambassador's comments and really a big thank you to David for an excellent summary. There was a lot of good information shared, good contribution to the open consultation process that we will take forward.
I want to sort of go back to some of the discussion that we had for a brief moment. When we look at improving the human condition by the SDGs enabled by ICTs ‑‑ and we heard some of this come through some speakers on the Setting the Stage, if you will, session, as well as through the interventions we heard many, we must not overlook the ethical development and use of ICTs especially in the era of rapid technological growth and such unimaginable data capture. I think it is a common under‑running theme that we do here and many topics and challenges that we address. Just add that into part of our conversations moving forward.
Thank you.
[Applause].
At this point we would move to our closing comment by our Host Country Chair.
>> VICTOR LAGUNES: Thank you so much. Thank you all very much for your active participation.
It is always a privilege to listen to different voices and opinions. Our position is truly one of strengthening the conversation. We see many points of agreement, many points of debate. This shows that this Forum complies with the objective that was set for it. We all know from our different trenches, countries, positions, our current responsibilities of the differences that we face, social, economic, gender differences as well as others, I think the important thing is to see how we can work together and to generate improvement and forward movement on the SDGs. I think also that by fostering these goals we have to be very careful to control that the Internet is not a platform for generating vulnerabilities for society when we have increasing issues of cybersecurity, we have to be very careful that this platform cares for that as well.
I think the economic, social development, they're core issues, but at the same time I would like to put on the table the need to work together, to curve, to control the potential for social damages. I would like to recognize the participation of a fellow Mexican who shares some of my concerns with perhaps not such technical jargon as the government industry, technical sectors, this is an opinion that's very developed and well-studied based on many of the reports we all have access to. At the end of the day, however, the objective, the concern, it is the same to provide, to have this platform for development of the community for social and economic development of our communities within this to foster the Sustainable Development Goals.
With this, I would thank you once again for taking the time to be with us today. I wish you very good work and debates and the most fruitful of results in our upcoming works.
Thank you.