The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF intervention. 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, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
***
>> Good morning, everyone. We will commence shortly. Thank you. Good morning to everyone and thank you so much for joining us this morning. My name is ‑‑ I am a tech lawyer. This morning you're joining us for the Africa open data entered research foundation and circus university session, which is session 83 of the Internet backback. So we had a session of building up to this particular one. We have really been talking about what the issues are on the ground, why there's a dire need and why we are fighting for meaningful transformation from a digital perspective. Why we need to play an integral part in achieving this particular objective. I'm not going to take too much of your time because I do know that this should really be more of an interactive session, wanting to hear everybody's opinions and statements because the only way we'll come to tangible solutions, we will talk. I will open the floor to Wisdom Donker. On my side will just give us an opening remarks and we'll proceed with the business of the day. Thank you very much.
>> WISDOM DONKER: My name is Wisdom Donker, the Executive Director for Africa coping data and Internet research foundation. I'm so happy that we gotten this far. I remember at a time when I was on the mark from 2016 to 2018 and I was coordinating Connecting and enabling a billion. So that is where we actually started working on, um, consultation with public to get feedback and as to how they approach to reach, we have to use in terms of Connecting rural communities. I remember there was a lady call Marilyn Kate and may her soul rest in peace. She used to ‑‑ she's mentored a lot of us including our Chair for the task force. And then Lee himself. I remember it was Marilyn who introduced me to Lee at that time and that was a time where we had been on all the discussion, but then the missing link was the electricity parts. Marilyn I introduced me to Lee and then he also has been within the space for some time now and he has ‑‑ he has done row search on it ‑‑ research on it. And thankfully, here we are with a backpack. So we have the person in Serbia and he will respond to the questions that will come. So as part of this program, the Africa opened data is collaborated with conciliation. We have this program in Connecting the rural communities with this backpack within our continent.
>> Thank you for that state and the background of where that story comes from. I will put a few ground rules if we can keep our messages as concise as possible, I will start once your time has been allocated. Dr. Danielle Smith. Dr. Danielle, please take the floor.
>> Danielle Smith: I would like to thank the representatives and the people of Ethiopia for your find hospitality and for giving us the opportunity to participate.
The launch of the Africa community internet project has provided an important opportunity for all of us here to learn from each other as to how the internet can be deployed to work towards the achieve minute of the sustainable development goals and our own professional and personal goals. This is not a vertical but rather a horizontal consensualization of goals and policy formulation. The speakers today include representatives of many different institutions and I am excited to be able to learn from their diverse perspectives. As such, I thank you again for this opportunity to learn about the Africa community Internet program and I turn it back to you.
>> MODERATOR: I think before we proceed, I would like to just acknowledge presence of honorable members, the honorable from botonna. I want to go back to our main optative for today, which is really getting us to start the conversation and getting the show on the road. I'm going to open up the floor. I want to ‑‑ Dr. Lee, you have a presentation, correct?
>> LEE McKNIGHT: Yes.
>> We will go to Dr. Lee and he is going to present to us and then we'll go into the use caseis, but let's start. Dr. Lee, the floor is yours.
>> LEE McKNIGHT: Thank you all for coming and attending and I am grateful for the opportunity to share our work and very excited to work with the Africa Rural Community Network Support Programme. Bee know the percentage is much higher here in Africa that is still unconnected here in 2022. Those of us privileged to be in this room or online know how difficult the last few years of the pandemic have been and how ‑‑ and almost unimaginably difficult they would have been if you were unconnected. This is an attempt, an effort to bring innovation to the edge to people not yet connected and will proceed from here. So why are we watching the African community Internet program? It's to first bring this particular innovation. There we go. I got it right. If you haven't been here before, this will be a refresher. We'll talk through the kind of approach we're taking and why the affordability of a shared resource that can be deployed anywhere on the planet within minutes and set up and Connect any community on the planet anywhere crossed Africa within minutes can make a difference also because the affordability of this approach versus infrastructure centric and I will say something briefly about the Costa Rican deployments. We also have live from Costa Rica colleagues here that will tell you more. If I don't convince you, hopefully they will on the impact that this technology can have for real people and real communities in real lives. And I just go back because on the record, I am a co‑inventor. I was on the board and I've been on the board with the company. I am here as a professor and my financial conflict of interest was managed by Syracuse University.
So the IMCON international back pack makes Edge commute and Connective. It is pre‑packaged right here in the room. We can see it later. Come by our booth later. If ‑‑ if it's within reach of Wi‑Fi, you can Connect over Wi‑Fi. If you're not within reach of an existing Wi‑Fi network, it will search for a cell tower. It can search across a couple different networks. If it can find a cell network, it will Connect to a cell network inside the back pack built in our very large antenna and a router which is a device down at the bottom right. And then you can amplify and boost the signal. That's one of the key aspects. Also in the pack is not just ‑‑ it includes a affordable solar panel, a battery. It is also a little mini‑micro grid. It is sustainable power and Connectivity. You can't just Connect anywhere consisting and be sustainable Connectivity because overnight, you can recharge everything in the pack through the solar power and the battery. The key aspect to make this work on the edge and on remote communities and provide a stable Internet connection and this is where we're disclosing again my financial conflict, but the pen was awarded for the edge wear software that provides a stable Internet connection where otherwise one would not have a stable Internet connection at the edge. And there's a couple phones and devices and next year, it would be tablets and are the more networks. Carrying on from there.
This is meant to be super easy and simple. The instructions were 1 of 3 steps to provide secure Cloud manage mobile Connectivity. The design parameters are up to 25 uses while in fact, my colleague sitting next to me did not listen and she connected 500 people the other week in Ghana to this one Internet back pack. It is also provide mesh networking. I think I got all this. What we're taking advantage of Cloud manage services for ways to Connect remote communities, which are all kind of mini ISPs. Each packet is its own ISP of users. So you don't need any professional in any community. Internet back pack operator which certainly can be anywhere in the room. And we don't need any degrees or credentials. You need to watch five YouTube videos and all can translate into any of the 3,000 African languages and again provide similar training and support readily to your communities. And going back momentarily to note that this work and the technology has been developed in cooperation with the Internet Society from its earliest phases and every step of the way and we're very grateful for that support, which enabled our next speaker, one of our next speakers to Connect multiple remote communities. Now we get two key aspects of this. We ask about the affordability from one perspective, this is again far more affordable than any alternative because it does not presume any new infrastructure investment. So otherwise, you assume you have to put in new infrastructure. But the back pack itself is around $15,000. The key parameter to keep in mind is the usage charges. If we have to use a satellite Internet antenna that comes in the pack, that is pricey expensive data, but that means that's why we can claim we know we can Connect anywhere. If we can Connect to a mobile service, that still cost something because we're paying a mobile carrier for the data charges. So for planing purposes, you have to think of the data charges and how to continue the amount for those going forward.
At some scale, the back packs alone are not enough. On some scale, we would recommend wireless networks that would provide access then to wify which would increase affordability of Connectivity. The province here would be roughly 30 million.
Finally, to conclude here and keep things moving before I get yanked, um, we think with this technology, which has been refined. Again, I want to do a shout out in spirit to Marilyn Cade who introduced us. It the at the Internet governance forum in Paris. It wasn't ready for prime time. This is now ready for prime time. It is already in a dozen countries. It is able to scale and it could, we believe hopefully to digital transformation for rural and open port communities and with the lawn of the Africa community Internet program accelerate connecting the unconnected and achieving sustainable goals by 2030. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you for really just wrapping up. I know you have done this presentation before, but every time we say it, you just learn something different and you come with a different angles. I will open up the floor to Estefana on line. From the Minister of communications in Costa Rica. I want to confirm. Can you had hear me? Stefana, can you hear me? So what we might do is swap it around. All the technical teams will short that out. I also then call Jane Asantay Wau and then we'll go am pardon me. In Ghana. Sorry. You can see this international back pack is confusing me. Jana is this your presentation. Please take the floor.
>> JANE ASANTEWAA: Sorry. I think this hasn't helped me a lot because of the altitude. My voice and everything is almost gone, but determined to til you my joy and what I'm doing. There's a sane in my local language and that's began A. when you find something good, I decided to bring it home to Africa to employment so that we can help people in the rural and underserved community. My research is to bring the internet Connectivity to rural areais to train teachers that are already online they can't get access to in order to help children. We found that the Minister of education has a lot of resources online, but when you're on a rural area where you can find internet Connectivity, how do you access the resources in order to train the kids that you have in your classed room. They don't have it and therefore, they use all the information they have to train the kids. I decided to take ‑‑ okay. I decided to take the back pack to a rural area for us to train kits.
So the picture you ski, that's the rural area library that one of the parents in Ghana has about 14 libraries in his district. And this is one of them. So we decided to go to a library and implement this process over there in order to train teachers. I'll tell you why we decided to go to a library. But knowing very well that rural teachers don't have access to when it comes to elect ritity, they're sacrificing their time because they can decide to go to rural areas. Children that are learn in rural areas did not decide because their parents are there. Their parents are farmers, Fisherman. That's where they have to be and then we always always move to the urban when they move to high schools or when they move to universities.
Now, this is the inside of the library that we decided to do a presentation. The reason we decided to use the library, the village had five high schools. We could have decided to use one of the schools just take the back pack and go to one school and do that ‑‑ Connect the Internet back pack. But we decided to use the library because it is a centralized area and teachers can go and use Internet on the computers. The children can go father, Mort, everybody in the community can seas the internet from the library. So that was the main reason why we decided not to use individual schools but rather use a centralized location in a community where everybody will gain access to the Internet. Now, we brought in about 34 teachers. At first we're a little concerned we night not get the teachers to come in. But the teachers would come in and I reason I put this woman with a baby is this woman was very determined to learn something so that she could share with her babies. She decided I have to be here to learn something in order to share with my children in the path and that was very touching. Now, the first day we set the system up, we came back the next day and surprisingly to us, one teacher was so happy that he brought kiss rids about 23 children to come and see on you that was a success at that time because we had done the presentation less than 24 hours and this teacher had graduated kits here and you could see that the children were so into what the teacher was trying to teach them. And that's what we want. We want the teachers to have the power so that they can train on next generation. We don't want our next generation of kids to fall into bad companies or to fall into a group where they won't be able to express themselves in different ways that will let them prosper in the future. This teacher's attitude is something we were looking for. We were not looking for it right away, but it happened 24 hours when we brought in the back pack. I also get feedback from the library that the library Yank makes me ‑‑ the library is now like a field trip for the schools. So they bring in their kids, have the computer the set up the Internet and the kids will be learning stuff on the Internet. It is something that we are really, really proud. I for myself am very proud they took this opportunity to bring something home to where these kids are old enough to get it, but now they take it and they're able to tell the paints that I went to the library and I finished my homework that thigh teacher gave me. The well will come in by themselves and not with teachers. They'll come in by themselves and learn how to use the key board and at the same time, learn how to Connect to the internet, this is what we want for our children. Believe was wherever we are, but this is what we want for our kids who are studied and the same picture over here that kids are learning how to use it. So this working backpack was really working and it connected these teachers and it's still Connecting the children that goes to the library. The librarian gave me numbers stating that since we started in November 17, 270 kids have walked in to use the back pack item by themselves. But the kids themselves came to use the Internet that we have prosided. So this is the key that we want for our communities and I hope you will find something important here and reach out to your governments so that we can had been our young kids. Thank you.
>> Stefano CATTANI: I will play a video as a background, but I'm going to be talking.
>> MODERATOR: Fantastic. Please go ahead.
>> Stefano: Thank you very much. All right. Dear members of the IGF community. Thank you very much for providing this space. According to national institutions, there are currently 600,000 people without internet connection in Costa Rica getting a gab for the central valley and coastal and rural areas where situations have been left behind in the access do technological opportunities. For years, they have fought an uphill battle trying to draw attention and withdraw solutions only to keep finding themselves in many ways. Access is for operation. They constitute a fundamental human right has led communities to underdevelopment and extreme unite. Yet. This is no prompt solutions in storage. This critical issue teamed up with the Internet Society foundation and Syracuse to provide a short term. Usually, we mapped out the areas in the country where it larged most of the entire business though. Once we worked low with come that would be impacted more positively by having easy is to the internet connection. Fly the process, three prior and informed consent, we found the communities we were looking for. Much it opened our guys to a whole new perspective to a shared keg having identified these communities and gone through a process of introduction and building, we presented them with a solution we were providing. The internet back pack. The back pack was designed to temporarily restore Connectivity; however, it became an opportunity to Connect remote and rural communities worldwide without an Internet connection. It Connects through a satellite connection using Forbeid connections to using communities with so far, we have delivered back packs to three different communities in Costa Rica. Anjelles and the north and bill mar in the same paving region. Among the three opportunities we have Connect over a thousand people including 500 plus children that did not have a connection previously to the Internet. Providing them with a tool through education, job, health and even Democratic processes. They have only had the tool for some months, we have started seeing a significant with high ambitions and expectations for their children are and their future. I want to invite you all to dream of a better future where no one is left behind and we have access do the same opportunities. We open the work we have done in Costa Rica serves as inspiration to all of you working on closing the individual gap around the world. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you for that presentation. You have drawn a very vivid picture of the impact, the use case and just seeing the communities that are being positively affected by ‑‑ by these back packs. I will open up the floor to our ‑‑ I think we'll start with Mr.Ipancelet, the Chairperson of the UNESCA task force. Take the floor.
>> Something that is needed and when Stefano was presenting the rights conference that will be taking place for the first time since we had all this locked down in Costa Rica. I think for a lot of activists who work in marginalized, vulnerable situations. This package is it will shut a lot of schools in the global south, but we have to understand that someone was telling me yesterday when ‑‑ it should be in some setting communities to help them go to school and all these places. This is out of things that this package. It is affected in one way or the other by not having the right connection. So I want ‑‑ the opportunity here especially within internet point activist in the community Africa we'll make sure to get the word around this back pack to help marginalize communities and we're working ber hind this. If you look at it cost wise, I think it's expensive, but if you look at the technology behind it, that $15,000 walking in tandem which isn't really a multi‑stakeholder environment. I think we can raise it for various communities in different parts of the world to make use of it. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much for those contributions and you touch on a very important point. Economies of scale and a lot of us come together as one and ensure that we split it out. It really does low are the cost. So looking at the factors there and seeing how that can impact a broader base of our African poppualous. I will open up the floor to the honorable from the public of Botswana. The floor is yours.
>> Thank you. I am here representing African network ‑‑ Parliamentary network. Internet govern eyewitness even though I came from Botswana, Parliament. But the most important thing is look at ‑‑ the key issue here is Internet book pack afford ant. They want is very, very paramount. And we have to take in the distance that once the back pack has been launched massively in Africa, it is going to cause a lot of (?) in the service providers. And the most important thing since we have the they must prepare to make sure if the government is not willing to regulate the package or go into the the private members bill ‑‑ that make sure we be in a different company once we can let it go of it in some areas, the 75 the solution orientedpeople who decided to say no. They can give the other side of the world to really taking place. I will give you the short answer that you have a family we'll be with you all the way to make sure that in Japan when we meet, we want to respect a massive mile stones of the back pack, the impact that will continue of this African American point he is going to be launched under the IGT has decided that roll out. We will have the same forms in a different consient. This is very powerful because we will be lang ningf the capacity building it will be there. Also submit madame moderator.
>> Everybody around absorbing this product and ensuring we're not issuing or ending justice or the legalities around technologies can. But see we're saying that we are all one family and you'll be with us quite a different work, they test it we're ensuring that we do not not just have already acknowledged one. I think there are requests. I will take that as a no. If you can please introduce yourself, where you come from and then your question if you keep it simple. Thank you very much.
>> Good morning, everyone. I am Sue Game. I think this topic is several irrelevant today and people are like myself who has been brown I told him we'll get back to what area. I have ‑‑ I have ‑‑ I have an associationd connected school just like that book pack. We each out to people to get understand already they have the opportunity to be connected and they use the Internet for like like yeah. We don't have that access and we are still using the same option but then the opportunities report differences. I have two questions that could be a clarification. Coming up with all this, as an ISOC member, we plan it out in the community lab, but most of the time, the challenges that we have is coming up to resources like spectrum resources because regulations not in place. In my country which allow NGOs or organizations coming up in a city like this and cut resources from the regulation, I want to understand and just to follow up what he was saying because I'm not sure in Ghana if they have any regulation in place and if there is how did you guys work with the regulations to make sure this was implemented and probably we can all learn from that and then see how those people work towards implementing the same thing in the African region.
Second question would be when it comes to sustainability and maintenance, who is responsibility and how do we mend the resources for the next 10 to 15 years in our community?
>> MODERATOR: I will take a round of questions and then answer them. Really good questions.will take the gentleman over there on the right and then we'll go to you, sir. Please take the floor and introduce yourself and keep it brief.
>> Thank you and good morning. I am Gilbert You inguinea from Kenya. I have two questions. One is on the architecture of the device. How does it integrate what does it integrate with the normal telephone system for mobile, for voice. I think there would be no issue. Secondly in terms of regulation and the hon ram member from Botswana with issues and the regulation for the back pack, being an imagined technology, but just maybe share with the rest of the team and the number of countries I think in Africa now developing what we call community networks, licensing framework and Kenya has put one in place. I think that would be a good place to start in terms of having the device anchored in law for the purpose of regulation. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Set the answers and take the floor.
>> Thank you very much. I'm from Ethiopia and the director for organizations for innovation and disaster development in Africa. Thank you for really interesting presentation of Africa to Connect the rural community and it's really a nice learning experience as I see from all of the presenters ‑‑ that was a really touching experience. Probably a couple of questions for analysts and the first question is, um, about the cost recovery. The cost of operation and the services covered us madame present from Ghana. The pay for the service. The issue for that can be analyzed. Um, the second question is probably if you are working in the rural community for those professor Lee presented, how much school is so far addressed with this Internet back pack. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: That will be the first round of questions and then we'll go to answers. Please answer and keep it brief.
>> My name is Charles from Malawi. In addressing violent exclusion of rural communities when it comes to access on the internet. I can relate because in Malawi, we only have 14.6% of the population that has access to Internet. In a country 17.6 million, you're talking about, you know ‑‑ about 86% of the population that has easy is to the Internet. We needed to address. In terms of the practicality, I am interested in this model and I always wanted to ask a question of how do we get involved. Who do we talk to and I really want to take this conversation beyond this decision. Thank you so much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much. One last question for this round?
>> Thank you. I am from Kenya. We work really close ‑‑ okay. I am from Kenya and I work on the IC network and we work really close with community networks and actually, I'm really glad to realize that this kits is well custom iced for community networks in enabling end users get access to the Internet.
My question is considering the cost of the kit, is it possible to consider an acquitted environment so that the users can get value even as they continue to pay for the kit. That one I think we'll save time time taken to ‑‑ soy I'll consider if you can integrate it into a system where the users can pay slowly until they fully make the final payment in the process like this. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much for that question and we'll start with Dr. Lee with his inputs and maybe start with the first ones and then we'll take it from there. Thank you.
>> I am sharing here for the innovation in the pack which relates to the edge ware software which you will see by mattie of north key province in the Democratic Republic of Congo. This is all available information that provides the technical details of how the backpack works. I will scroll down. I will start with the most important one which is this one, which is side ways. But we'll look at it side ways. That's the way it is. Okay. So essentially, if we were in any of these communities ‑‑ we just tried to Connect them and with the technology of the pack, which is designed to provide a stable connection across bad or thin links or narrow ban links, you can get a quality Internet experience where it's not otherwise available. That's core innovation that makes this whole thing work. So that's ‑‑ and this is recognized by the U.S. patent office as of March of this year. I'm going back up to the income ‑‑ oh, another key table here. So about the architecture. Let me get down to ‑‑ where is it? Okay. Here. All right. So the question was whether about the legalities and reggual story framework and that's a very important point. We interacted with governments, multiple governments in Africa and multiple ministries both President Wea and Ellen Johnson Surleaf and many things to coordinate. The key point it wasn't necessary for the pack itself. It incorporates ‑‑ all you need to do is buy a SIM card that you put into the cradle point router, which is the same that you would use somewhere else for data points and if you could have it for multiple networks like MTN or awaycom. So we're not doing anything different. It's just that this combination of technology, this integration of technology provides this powerful access. Secondly, if we're Connecting by we Wi‑Fi which again I would assume is legal across the African continent. The satellite receiver may well require legal authorization in individual nations for the right to operate those. So point taken particularly for the satellite Internet. There's two models of the pack. One version that is a cheaper one comes without the satellite Internet and that would have ‑‑ again, I think that would be straight forward from a legal point of view. Something to streamline and recognize the power providing, you know, the thing is we've going into community. If we haven't any professional engineers that have already gone there, we don't know exactly which way we will be able to Connect there until the pack arrives and we figure it out what can actually work to provide that connection. Let me try. It is hard to remember all the different questions. This table here, um, essentially there's not one solution. There's many different technologies and different frequencies and ways to coordinate. But you see Wi‑Fi, Bluetooth, things that have already got regulatory and government approval. Now we're using a different satellite service that is mentioned in the patent. Let me think. Am I forgetting some of the key points or should I stop there?
>> MODERATOR: Let's stop there. I'll take a second round of questions. Let's answer the first ones. I think there was ‑‑
>> So important point on financing. So again, I'm speaking for myself as a professor and collaborator. But I'm aware because of the time I was on the board with the company that lease financing would be available if this was, you know, purchased in bulk that this would be something that would be potentially available. So something cooperation between again public financing sources and private financing sources, then the private financing could make this technology available and, ah, on a lease BASIS on this kind of pay as over time BASIS. And then ‑‑ oh, and the data charges. So our experience has been that community, one of those communities that Stefano was showing you in Costa Rica. How were these data charges going to be paid beyond the length of the Internet Society foundation contract ‑‑ or terms. And the paramedics in that community what do you ‑‑ do they want their kids to go offline and not have education resources? Individually, they could not afford their own personal Internet connection but for the community, for their families, they said we'll pull our money. This is a remote community of guards and maids working with no access to anything. And they were not going to wait for government program around to provide to sustain Connectivity. So last ‑‑ one more element there. What happens ‑‑ this equipment is not designed to last for 20 years. So be nobody is going to promise this will last that long. It's basically a commercial off the shelf disposable technology on a lease finance BASIS would be advertised over 3 years; however, the first pack is still operating and it's upgrade the. The course offers on the Cloud. So it can be updated and refreshed and modern iced remotely. Let me see if there is some last element there. I guess that covers most of the things that I can remember from all of the questions. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much. I will open up the floor to both Wisdom just to look at the questions around the regulatory framework. I think something was pointed about community networks and how do you have that synergy between this type of product and the regulators and existing infrastructure. So I think I'll open up to ‑‑
>> Yes. Just to adapt to what Lee said. In terms of the financing, so that is why Africa opened the Internet research foundation collaborating (?) to come up with a program that's named Africa community internets program. So this is what we are going to use to drive this backpack in the continent to make sure that we reach enough funding to get enough on the backpack into that continent. So the community across Africa is going to hear from us very soon. We have approached a number of institutions and also in the discussion with the web bank, Adaand the other organizations and I will show (?) will be engaging with the outfits can help this program especially getting into the various governments within the continent. I think we need them at this stage to see how we can refine some of the processes for us to be able to bring enough of the backpack into the communities. Yes. We also had a income of approaches especially from the private people. They always have the mindset of making business with it. Someone wanted to get it in at the lower cost and sell it at the higher cost. So I think this back pack we need to control it and make sure that it doesn't end up in the wrong hands. So that is why we are here and we'll work with the parliamentarians as well and they'll guide us to what we have to do going into the various countries. So we'll talk about the regulation aspects. We're looking at $100 million for the first phase. That is what we are looking at. We are showing it. Yes.
>> MODERATOR: So quickly before we do that, I wanted to end on the financing aspect of it. Get on to that and you can jump on immediately after that. Thank you.
>>
>> LEE McKNIGHT: So the back pack is in over a dozen countries. I am on the board inside the company at this point. Thank you.
>> Thanks for that. Just like my colleague said, it's important that we recognize the importance of ruling out the community program and what we aim to do is also with all our experience and regulation and policy across the continent to also Connect with the various governments and regulatory institutions. From my experience in champion in the Connectivity, the regular institutions are paramount and the ministries are also very paramount. I like to speak first about the power of cocollaborators and organizers. Professor Lee and you can just use your normal data to just insert and you get Connectivity as well as use it to Connect to the Wi‑Fi available. The back pack policy wise and regulator is complimentary. It's a complimentary Connectivity that we are using to Connect to those who are often fall on the site of the Connectivity gap, but most importantly also as I did yesterday, we always appeal for the collaboration of our IMTs or Telecoms operators. It's important that this equipment has been able to exceed in connecting more people than ‑‑ we offer more co‑platforms and co‑collaborators to do this. So it's very important. Second thing is that for the regulation, we know across Africa community network is a very innovative with new to us. I think one of the good things that we are doing at Africa open data and now we're collaborating that we're able to offer policy briefs, offer up regulatory loads and especially the whole governments aspect now. Where we can have ‑‑ the back pack offers and they can Connect whatever device. We have seen this with the Ghana case and the Costa Rican case that children are able to do it and use it for various purposes. And we also want to emphasize that just as we are using the educational case, use cases, they are various applicabilities. Professor Lee talked about the DRC case. There's potential for agriculture. There's a potential for health and disaster recovery. And the opportunities are enormous and we welcome everybody and we also appeal to our regulators. We're open and we'll be talking to you and it's important that we collaborate with both institutions and open to over. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: How do we collaborate? I think the question from the gentleman speaking about the violent exclusion of our people where you will find quite similar to the young lady over here who said young people are expected to write the same exams, but do you find people who got resources from the education and people who simply don't tell anyone to come to the criteria of marking and leaving and getting qualification. That conversation and collaborations, so my answer is go to the booth. We do have members that are always manned and it is really open to that. I think maybe I can open that up to consulate.
>> One of the good things is to get local ministries involved. When I mean local ministries, they're ministries of communication and digital economy. Let them know. In most cases, things come up like this. You have Civil Society access and maybe the Internet Society and all those people and the look is not aware. They are the ones in the long run that are able to galvanize funding. Through the World Bank to say okay. We have this device working with so and so partners to get it to our schools and to hospitals because it is for medical. I encourage folks in terms of engagement to always involve their ministry of communication and digital economies. Sometimes it's bureaucratic, but at least let them know and I'm sure you'll get results after that. That's my latest contribution. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Very interesting suggestion. Looking at ‑‑ I wouldn't say low cost solutions, but solutions that allow for payments or installment payments. I know that's a difficult one to answer, but maybe we can open that up to Dr. Lee. Just for your input of something of that nature, yeah. Thank you.
>>
>> LEE McKNIGHT: So first, over the 4 or 5 years since the creation in earlier phases or operational back pack, the observe storier toy in the Democratic Republic of Congo, shortly thereafter, we were in communication and discussions with both the national ‑‑ national Ministry of planning and education before anything arrived in the DRC and I note because of the conflict zone situation, it was difficult collaboration, but for a research project direct from the university, we were able to get the pack in. But we had five governors in the DRC ready to work with us to collaborate and get the more packs into the country, but we present able to do it. With other intermediaries and partners and some of those issues could be overcome. Secondly, I mentioned the early experience with the Liberian government and not governments from one transition to one regime to the next. Again working with the ministry of telecommunications and health and education ministry. One ministry heard about this. We started on education in the health ministry and said no. Wait a minute. We want it too and so we said okay. That makes perfect sense and we broaden the conversation. It makes the ministry pose telecommunications ministry of state and education, ministry of health. All should be involved and aware in these conversations and because it helps sort of galvanize support and make its easier to accommodate progress.
Going back to the installment payment issue, if there is public/private partnership, I'm not sure how that works at the scale, but I know the commercial financing would be available it would be paid back over time. How that would work and translate into programs funded through the Africa development bank or the World Bank or Ues inca, there would be lease financing available. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much for that. I will open up the floor for second round of questions. Apologies. Before we do that, I will turn it over to Jane.
>> JANE ASANTEWAA: So I wanted to point out with the community that I was working with the teachers and the children, one of the statements that the municipal librarian came, what she said was this is something that we need for our kids and therefore, we can as family members to buy in. It's not always saying thank you, but also it should be part of it and own it and therefore, they should be at least paper use like maybe paid one city in order to come and use the computers and Internet in the library, which is something that the librarian was suggesting. If the community comes together and they know that this is going to be good for our children and also for us in agriculture, they can also come up with a way of financing the data by end data for the system. Being part of it makes you own the system. So that's something that we should also look at.
>> MODERATOR: Absolutely. Thank you so much for that input. Any questions from the floor? We got one. We got two. Okay. I want to confirm. We have three physically. Asking questions online. Online moderator, are there any questions? You can say no. I don't see any hands online. I'm going to start with the gentleman on my right. Sir, please introduce yourself.
>> Good morning. My name is Daniel from Uganda. Keeping all protocols and views represent my past views. They're not for the government or for Africa, but also for the people that I meet. First and foremost, we have experienced a lot of Internet shut downs both regionally and globally. I see this as one of the solutions. For the developers of this back pack, envision this backpack been incorporated for using pirate networks or pirate (?) where interset systems have gone down and also for the social media has been used to convey messages both good messages and bad messages that some of the governments don't like. And when it comes to governments, we'd like to use that interesting excuse of shutting down the Internet because of national security. Obviously if national security is being put into consideration, then it just fights because the countries base themselves on stability. So how do you envision this network being used in their critical scenarios like these ones? (?) the parent network to enhance the communication. Will this nation be able to support it? If you have the money, you can invest in that, but in case I am going to face a problem and set up those parent notes through heated networks, then needs really thought. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: I am quite interested to hear the response to that. A second question to the gentleman on my right and then we'll go to the lady behind. Thank you.
>> Thank you very much. I have a question. Were you using a satellite network? Because we know that once the ‑‑ the quality of the celrulor network is not as good as the one in the city and how many computers will you be able to Connect inside the labs? Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Could we please have the third question on my right?
>> Good morning. Mine is not really a question.
>> MODERATOR: If you could introduce yourself for the floor.
>> I am from Botswana heading environmental social governance portfolio in Botswana. So mine is not really a question, but really to employ the house. To ensure they're involved particularly in rolling out very useful initiatives such as these. I for one am looking at launching Elibraries in Botswana and rural Botswana next year. I am very much interested in knowing how to collaborate to make sure that beyond just having the educational materials available to the communities how can we make sure that the Internet they have access to all the other existing resources that may not necessarily be on open source. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much for that. I will take two questions if there are any.
>> I would like to look at the blind sport of the backpack. We talked about the backpack in the nearest tower. I would like to know when we're talking about the nearest tower, 300 kilometers so we can see because I know my country, that village, the nearest tower so that I can see whether the backpack is being compatible to the situation on the ground I would like to be answered.
On the issue of shutdowns of the networks, the shutdown of the networks normally and security, the security in Africa is coming into the election, general elections. It is the time where you head about the language and there's a security threat that we have to close out and shut down the Internet, but it is very, very important to make sure that if once we came up with the regulation, we have to know indeed, whether the shutdown will affect the backpack as well. We can tab from the satellite and the shutdown ‑‑ because they have to go to the satellite to come in and take the backpack to include them in the vault in the main city. Thank you.
[Laughter]
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much. We have one more question and I want to see how many more questions before we close this round of questions. You have two. Please go ahead, sir.
>> okay. Thank you. My name is Eric and I'm from Rwanda. I am very impressed by this initiative of backpack and internet and I think very good it will be the answer for Connecting and connected different part of communities in the year of Africa. So I would like to share some initiatives that you have in Rwanda. Maybe it will be very beneficial to other parts. So we have what you call ICT classroom. So this ‑‑ the program is established by the government, but it helps the people allowing the schools to be connectd wherever they are. And this comes with a million services. I think some of you had a body. These are initiatives of Connecting people but providing public services to the people and instead of taking a long time going to the offices and this helps our people to get the government services to get certification in the businesses as well as help the new communities to be connected. So there is still a gap because allowing 70% ever communities are not yet connected in the internet and I think when we integrate with this Internet backpack initiative will be very beneficial to Connect other areas, which are not yet connected. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much, sir. Please go ahead.
>> Thank you. My name is (?). My company work was delivering resource in digital format to remove the ‑‑ there is no Internet. What we do is just we load curriculum content into the tablet and additional resource that will get really from the server into ‑‑ from the Internet into the server. And it's available online, but it can ‑‑ offline, but we have visit online. (?) updates. This is different regions and, um, what I want to know about your technology is how do we make this more accessible to the nearby area? This one is ‑‑ this solution is work in the school's environments. When you have a big resource on the server and then that one is the wireless in the school. So this one Connects and the resources offline, which is loaded on the server through their devices. Therefore, how this technology can just support that type of initiative in Utopia. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much for that. Before we answer these round of questions, I will give the floor to really grace us with these words and I'm sure he pingd up the gist of this conversation. Max, the floor is yours.
>> MAX: Thank you very much and good morning to everybody. I am sorry to be late. It is a pleasure to be here with you. Very good initiative for Africa internet community back up initiative. Why it is important? Because it's developer alternative Connectivity tools for digital Africa and also to advance this collaborative internet activity across the continent. As you know, the continent needs this kind of initiative. When you look at our current situation, the situation is not ‑‑ it's not ‑‑ it's not very, very bad, but still we have a lot of challenges facing in the continent. As Africa is a second nation in term of population in the world. The list connected continent with 33% of population access to Internet. Additionally, the list connected country in the world is in Africa. I give you just 3. You have every three around 90% of the population doesn't have access to the internet. Central Africa, 8/9 has access to Internet. Why this initiative is important to overcome this challenge of access. The key is limited critical. The issue we ‑‑ one of the speakers talk about it. It is very important and critical just for the election. If there is some movement, the Internet research shuts down. It is not something available. It is a human right. The issue of regulatory framework, we have developed African we want from 2016 and by 2050, the population will have 25 year and 70% will have 35 year. We have several gaps that give the development. Cybersecurity also is across in the continent. We have to overcome this. The political also is very important. It is linked to the political as well as this limited access in the rural area. Access for the disability population and also for the marginal population. It is some key action where this initiative can help form the continent. How this can help we need also to customize this initial to the African realty. Something very important as I say before to this key activity. And when I look at the optative, I am very happy to see this initiative can address some key element to overcome to the current situation in the continent. Let me ‑‑ I'm going to highlight some to address the benefits of the details for whole African people. The fair formal sector is a woman and this will help to bridge the detail gender gap. It is one of key elements of this great initiative. Also the parameter detail connected in the contributing to help African country for the development and achieve the sustainable goal and also the A263 atoperation. I think it can provide parameter to achievement is very important. And the policy ‑‑ it's a possibility also to have self‑help Connectivity during this user Connectivity, technology Connectivity, addressed to the need of Africa. Today is the 5G. We need technology adapted to the need of the population according to them. Give this initiative that can provide this. Also we have ongoing initiative to analyze ongoing initiative to the potential of Africa for this revolution. Also, this initiative again stimulates some policy recommendation. Why we need the enablement of all and I think we start today and next year in Tokyo, the initiative will come to key ‑‑ we can show key (?) not to Africa, but to the world. It is eye commitment by young generation and population we can come to provide something positive for our continent. I would like to say something congratulations and all people behind this initiative and to answer UNECA will support this initiative to make it very successful and very popular across member state and across the world. Thank you very much.
[APPLAUSE]
>> MODERATOR: So much for that. We will hold you to that. It is well noted. So I'm just going to open up ‑‑ okay. We have been instructed to pause there for a bit. So rime going to open up the floor again ‑‑ I think he knows exactly what to do.
>> Okay. It is an honor of ECA. Thank you very much and good luck.
[APPLAUSE]
>> MODERATOR: Thank you. So I'm going to go back to the questions that were asked. I will highlight them. So the first question from Daniel from Uganda. I won't mention names, but let's look at the questions. So we got looking at the corporation of higher networks and really looking at what does that mean and I think a really good example is looking at governments and having that flexibility, I think we can call. I wonder who will answer the question from our panels. Let's go to Lee.
>> LEE McKNIGHT: So we have been considering these issues from the very beginning and interacting with groups that were independent let's say. Let's not use the word pirate. The design of the backpack that comes and looking very innocuous like any other backpack it is something that activists appreciate that it is not obvious to authorities when you have it.
Second issue, we went into the conflict zone of north KEVO where there are more peacekeepers and unrest right now. And also going into South America and regions with drug trade. I think order legal activities we had to consider these matters and finally, I should note upfront I'm a co‑founder of the Dynamic Coalition. So we haven't disclosed to all of you that if you purchase this pack, you're embedding human rights in every pack by design. That's how it has always been considered. If there is illegal activity, someone, someone that's helping support back pack knows where the pack S. we'll just stick with drug running. If the pack is outside of where the purchaser or user is and it looks like it is being used to transport illegal drugs, it's possible it is outside the terms of service and it can be shut down. If it is stolen and being used for illegal purposes, it can be remotely brickd and shut down automatically.
Now, for the legitimate uses of populations where there is no reason under human rights considerations to shut it down, we're talking about ‑‑ but if a government would ‑‑ we can't stop governments from telling satellite providers or jamming frequencies. They would have to jam frequencies. We consider these issues and independent groups not pirate groups can certainly take advantage of these technologies.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much for that. So we'll go to the next question, which is looking around the quality and Connectivity of how many people can Connect. Yes.
>> LEE McKNIGHT: You don't see it, but built into the pack are two large antenna for the cradle point router. So when your cell phone shows no bars, the router can still pick up a distant signal. Now, so how many more kilometers depends on the ‑‑ we can see in some cases the Costa Rica deployments, we had to be in certain parts of a town where it worked and then if you went to the other part of the town, it was outside of the range. And when it wouldn't work. It provides an extended range, but also depends on the geography on whether mountainous or flat terrain, how far the signal might reach from the nearest cell tower.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much for that. I think that does answer the question around the blind spots of deployment. It's really a case by case, which I think it needs us to be going to the different localities. There was a statement and I think an invitation from Botswana around the Private Sector involvement, roll up and collaboration. Maybe we can have a quick talk to what's happening on the ground from a Private Sector perspective ensuring that there is a social impact element from this particular project, but looking at that responsibility of the private sector has for rural marginalized and impoverished communities.
>> Thank you so much for that question and it's important that we recognize that we don't operate in silos and we also operate collaboratively.
This program as we were rolling it out is open. It's not just we operating with our development community. We operating with our academic community, but we also open to collaborate with all the various sectors because it is important that once we are doing our work, we are able to also Connect with other people who are doing similar things and we are able to. We're able to strengthen the work that we're doing and it's also enhancing the kind of work we do because whether we realize and it is good that we're here in this room today is that there are various initiatives that are done by other communities and other organizations. The beautiful thing that we are collaborating should speak to that. We are able to bring people together and we also able to put an action. And definitely whether Botswana, Uganda, any country or organization, we're open to do that. I think in just ending, one of the things that we realize is that in Africa, it is very similar problems. We are ‑‑ we are people who are resilient, but also to put fort solutions. We want this grass roots solution to be the people orientation and we give them that opportunity to do that. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so upon for that and I am going to allow one more and then we're going to close this session.
>> Thank you very much. I come from KOMOROS and I am the director of regulation from Tellco. Most of the people might think that such kind of solution is bad for Tellco, but my own experience I'm happy to discover the solution. A couple of weeks, I visited some remote farm that do not have access to Internet. And they're asked to go in the area and deploy networks. But the cost to deploy networks is not easy. We need to design the network to get money and come back with equipment. I think the solution can be also used by Tellco. You know in term of competition, if we can say a community while before coming in this region with well-designed network, we can provide you something in the first step to allow community to learn how to use and how to be able to weigh the solution that is going to be deployed a couple of miles after. The way we present the solution can be also put it this front of Tellco. It can be used instead of using repeater. As Tellco, we provided repeater to some VIP accessory, but for communities, we can use the solution and it comes with all ‑‑ a lot of options that only what can be provided by repeater.
The second point I would like to know if there is aside a skill transfer because we all know we have the mots like ISOC ‑‑ models like ISOC who are promoting the community network and comparing with those other models. Does the solution come with this part of skill transfer? Do we ‑‑ because the needs we all know that the needs is huge in Africa and I'm sure on the global south the solution come with this openness and to allow replication and not only to be commercial solution. Even it's cheaper. And then at the end, I'm also providing some country in Madagascar if it can help, we can talk again. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you for that. I'm going to actually I think we can give the team a go with that. You really gave us amazing content there. Good questions. So I think let's start. Maybe we can start a quick one and go around and just have a set of answers to respond to that. That's all you said.
>> I think Usev will be the first to respond.
>> Thank you for being here and allowing us to share the technology and the aspiration. There's a lot of comments that are running through my mind to say and respond to. So I'm going to try to first enhance our aspiration a bit because I think it's deadly important and I use that word specifically for us to ensure that our communities have access to Internet. But what I want to impress upon folks is not just our ability to implement a gender 2063 and we're falling way behind. But the utility about the internet provides for young people and for your ability to engage in the InterConnected global economy. What we're talking largely about here is education opportunities and that's tremendously important. Healthcare opportunities tremendously important. There is also specific commercial opportunities. One of the challenges that we see with social media is the inability to do natural language processing and machine learning in your languages to address content moderation issues to the questions that were raised about social media and the questions that were raised about disinformation, et cetera. The ability to have Internet Access Now affords our children the ability to get access to that. So the things that I'm trying to get us to understand is how do we get the ability to ensure we have digital wallets and exchange commerce? There's so much more that can be done by having that solution there. To the esteemed gentleman from como dose, thank you for your point. We really do look at these as complex areas and not competitive and working with telecommunicative providers to ensure extended access. Many have mandates to ensure that they are providing access to those communities, but do not have the capacity and infrastructure cost are so excessive. So what this provides is an ability to Connect ‑‑ but its ability to tap into existing cellular networks and then further enhance that is something that I think was missing. I want to make sure to tee up to you to allow an expanded answer to that question.
>> I will start there. Our experience is again depending on the height of the tower. Depends on the local topography and so essentially if there's a cell tower more than 6 or 7 kilometers away probably you still ‑‑ we won't be able to reach it. I don't know. Depends on the height. We don't know. Depends on the particular circumstances. So that's where the satellite Internet would have to come in to provide some level of Connectivity even if very limited or even saying you can only use it for What's App messages. That would be something that would vary. In our experience around the world, many places where populations are also in Africa does the cellular network is pretty built out and the population is usually not 50 kilometers away from the nearest cell tower, but some number less than that. So we can't ‑‑ we can't promise for any particular community without bringing it there and it might be ‑‑ I'm thinking back to the town in Costa Rica. They were saying it works here in the town hall, but we want to move it. All we can say is sorry. Leave it in the town hall. This is where you can get the signal. That's what you gotta do. So I'll ‑‑ let me see if there was something else I want to say.
>> Thank you very much. This global opened it up for agriculture and (?) the Executive Director is very much interested in this and I think you have ongoing projects with the word bank. I think 100 million dollar project with the World Bank. He's thinking along what you said about a family and all that. What we want to do is see how to Connect you to the (?) to see how your country can benefit from the program and also the backpack.
Apart from that, the other thing I have to say is because we deploy the backpacks and Connect communities, we also have to think alongside content. We have to get an example. This project we work with global GODAN and the project is (?). Most of the time, families produce and at the end of it, they lose all the projects. So the initiative that we are working on is, um, the end of the (?) the farmer will go to the stock and validity stock and then the stock produced and noted the value. So at that point in time, the farmer can go and there is a middle point with a bank or something. The farmer can get a transition from the stock and get some credits against the stock from the bank. So those are some of the projects that we are working with for a greater nutrition. This is content and that means he has to write on the metric. So they should be able to sit at home and request for those things. So those are some of the content that I'm talking about. If you go to to have the same educational sector, and then I know there is some contents around. We just need to get the best and try to see what we can do on the network for those to be accessing. And the other one in (?) team. That's another content. So (?) entertainment, the chance of moving to the communities will somehow minimize. Then the chance for them to produce more (?) will also minimize. If you look at those communities, what they're doing is just farming. When they go home, the only (?) is man and wife in the bedroom. They produced so many children and that means probably to keep going up. So that is some of the things we have to be thinking about. The other is skills. We do the data for ‑‑ we have been doing a number of training on different topics. So this is another training that we have to think about and see how we can localize it. One other thing that we are discussing is to see how we can have ‑‑ we can do the assembly in Africa. So maybe we can decide that Ghana can be the country to host that and all assembling all the devices and know that we will be done in Africa and then a deployment of those devices to various countries within the continent would be done within Africa. So that means we needed to structure everything very well. There's a lot of work for us to do and then I can promise that in the program, (?) we'll make sure that we satisfy all stakeholders moving forward.
>> LEE McKNIGHT: Following up on the questions and training and openness I want to mention the young African leaders initiative are Yaley, which is supported by the U.S. state department and the max well school of citizenship at Syracuse University is hosted every year. We have scholars that also participated here in IGF. Secondly as I mentioned this morning, I have been interacting with the U.S. Department of Commerce about this process. So the more that Africa does on its own, the more the U.S. government might be willing to also co‑support to some extent. Of course, I can't promise anything for anybody, but train the train professor Smith will be happy I mentioned this. But train the trainer's model which perhaps on some short‑course program where we have intense training, parliamentarians and the people here in the room with some level of support so that they're comfortable with this and have a fully equipped to understand their impact for their communities and their nations. And having people be empowered to again take the training to their nation to their region, to their sector is certainly something that we have always intended and as you can see from the case in Costa Rica where we have worked with ‑‑ the reason that we are there is because of a ‑‑ a former Ph.D. student from the max well school who is leading a non‑profit. We are an educational student. We're also an expensive private university. So we're not expecting or assuming that there will be massive transfers of human capital. We're workings and collaborating in an open manner to transfer knowledge and skills and one more thing Wisdom forgot to mention. The African Internet community goes forward and not just south Africa, West Africa. Different regions have regional centers of excellence and expertise where they can help and support neighboring nations and communities. As the scales and cascades along, then the skills and expertise can more and more localized and not depend on a very distant north American university.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much. Unfortunately, I will close this second round of questions. I am being poked by my colleagues to let the lady in the Red speak. So we're going to do that.
>> Thank you very much for allowing me to speak this morning. You know this initiative. I'm working with the USF at the universal access funding in Tanzania and yesterday I spent a lot of time in the backpack booth. I was very much impressed with the work. What I can say is we in Tanzania we welcome you guys to come. We are more than happy and willing to support in whatever manner that we are supposed to be doing because we know that whatever that any case when we want to introduce different technology, you need to really engage different stakeholders. In terms of funding, maybe you can also think of try to, you know, convince some u SF in different count radios and see how we can collaborate and make the thing happen. Like in my country, when you are saying there might be a contradiction between the operators and this kind of technology. My take is like no because I'm struggling with operators to, you know, go and draw out communication services in villages. So with this solution, I'm 100% surena operators will be happy to have this technology. We like tried to redo the burden to do the Internet Connectivity. So we are more than willing to partner with you. We're welcoming you guys to come and see how we can pilot or make together. Thank you so much.
[APPLAUSE]
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much. I am very, very happy that my colleagues saw the light. I'm going to open up the floor to Daniel Smith. He's going to give us remarks and then we'll call it a session. We'll call it a day.
>> Thank you so much. I begin my conclusions with thanks to the honorary dignitaries who took the time to attend this session, to other important guests to all of our guests, thank you so much for all your contributions, your request questions, your partners. Your participation has included to the launch in the community Internet program.
As we look around this room and other rooms over the course of the week that we have been here, we can see that there are seats that are not filled and these seats really are not empty. Rather to me they represent the unrealized potential of the people who we work with who are not represented as these tables and whose voices are not heard. We should not be complacent or speaking for these people. They should be here and they should be speaking for themselves. These are the children that Jane talked about whose parents would rely on their son to help them fish. These parents have allowed their son in a Spain of a few peeks to live the way they make their living to attend school and to go to a library to access the Internet and to use computers which Jane worked with Syracuse University and she shipped, she paid to ship these computers which the university donated to the library and to see pictures that Jane has shared of over 500 children in less than 1 month leaving their work to support their families to be in these libraries. These children should be here telling their stories. The young girls in Liberia in school will use the Internet backpack to do research on environmental issues in Liberia, my country of origin to sit at a conference and hear these high school girls present on their work. This is what potential realized means to be in Costa Rica and to climb up a hill with list and to ship and slight in the mud and to get to the school muddy and to realize that those kids at the school, every single day they climb up that mount own which we could not do. They did not have enough food to eat and the little they had for lunch, they gave to us and we felt so guilty after when we realized that this was their meal for the day. That is what potential does.
I think of my own children when Jane asked the question: What do we want for our children? We all here are privileged to be at this point and we want for our children educational opportunities, healthcare, 21st century literacy and job skills. Technology skills. These are the skills that my own children have. I have seen my children and the students that I teach stay up all night using the internet to study, to get these skills so that they can be competitive in a 21st century economy. What we want for our children as we sit in this room is what we want for other people's children. This is what we want for the children in the village. This is what we want for those children in Costa Rica. We are not here to cell the Internet backpack. We are here to partner with you to sell potential, to fulfill opportunity, to provide education, digital training literacy skills, healthcare, we are here to sell the opportunity of pledge for those children to be at IGF Japan next year and to speak for themselves and not through our voices. And ultimately, that's what we open to partner with you to sell. Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so. For that, Dr. Smith. That was so touching and I really hope that touches each and every one of you the same way it did myself and understanding that when we talk about changing the world, literally this is an opportunity to become the change that you want to see.
So I'm going to ask Peter to give us the key options. Peter?
>> Thank you so much, Madame Chair. Daniel summarized everything. Let me get some points tire markel for putting some things together as well. So we talked about a number of arsians from this launch. The fallout and collaboration is essential to bridging the digital device and 60ing their own connected and that's brilliant. I know connected in Africa. And also we can say literacy has been pinged in connecting the community network and that's the old incidents that we're seeing the internet backpack across and we can say that community Internet program brings access to the community as well as to operationalize employment (?) and you could see from the discussions so for that there is need for policy and regulation to address the unforeseen issues that can help with ‑‑d internet backpack in the community. The deployment has been proven as an enabler to remine features to sassy to produce quality student and the next generation leaders in Africa also, we see that there is neat for collaboration and ‑‑ I will stop there because of time. Thank you, everybody, for joining us today. Especially thank you to Africa open date and Internet research foundation at Syracuse opportunity for putting all this information together and exposing us to the collaborations, exposing us to partnerships and really what can happen. This is a dream that we have been looking for. This is really that Connecting point that I think as you can say bridges that gap of the connected to unconnected. But I think I'll send there but also ensuring that everybody's Bluetooth and later I encourage you to go to the booth, speak to the team create those conversations and those connections. Next year coming to Japan we'll be reporting back to magic and having more stories such as Dr. Know why it is so dire and in the income 3 to 5 years, I want to hear stories of the people themselves saying they worked in these circumstances and impoverished communities. They use the internet and connectivity to change their lives. Aye seen digital results. I really do thank you for giving me the opportunity and our session is adjourned. Thank you very much.