President Paul Kagame yesterday chaired the Global Broadband Commission meeting which was held on the sidelines of ongoing United Nations Assembly in New York, US.
In his address, he said that broadband connection plays a pivotal role in growth in developing countries therefore called upon them to put more efforts in advancing Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to cut red tape to global prosperity and well-being.
Here is full speech of President Paul Kagame:
Distinguished ladies and gentlemen
Mr. Carlos Slim, my fellow chair
Mr. Houlin Zhao and Ms. Irina Bokova for Vice Chairs of the broadband commission
Mr. David Nabalo, Special advisor to UN Secretary General on MDGs
Distinguished commissioners
Ladies and Gentlemen
Good morning once again!
I wish to continue our discussions on how to ensure that the opportunities created by broadband connectivity reach everyone on our planet. The Broadband Commission has already done impressive work in that direction.
We have seen the numbers more than the half of the world population still do not have connection access to internet mostly in the developing world, as the developed countries turn their focus to the higher-end of this technologies whether it’s the internet things, big data and other emerging areas.
Developing countries have to work harder and smarter to both catch up and take advantage of the next phase of the digital revolution, we must therefore remain ambitious.
The global broadband provides both useful framework and also opportunity to raise our focus beyond connecting people towards innovation, transformation and growth. This requires bolder thinking and organization and higher expectations of everyone involved.
The broadband cannot solve all world problems but we know it can accelerate progress in overcoming biggest obstacles to global prosperity and well-being.
Finally, I would like to invite all of you to the Transform Africa summit which will take place in Kigali 19th to 21th of October where African leaders of governments and business and others from across world will be meeting to support their efforts ongoing in Africa to have this transformation building on ICTs take place.
We will discuss how to harness ICTs to make African cities more sustainable and economically vibrant. We hope to see many of you there and thank you and look forward to our conversation today.