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Multi-nation collaboration boosts ICT stats

Simnikiwe Mzekandaba
By Simnikiwe Mzekandaba, IT in government editor
Botswana, 24 Nov 2016
The ITU's Susan Teltscher calls on policy-makers to form collaborations in order to improve ICT data. (Photograph: ITU/J Marchand)
The ITU's Susan Teltscher calls on policy-makers to form collaborations in order to improve ICT data. (Photograph: ITU/J Marchand)

Collaboration is one of the steps that can be followed to improve the quality, availability and dissemination of ICT statistics or data.

This was the sentiment shared by Susan Teltscher, head of human capacity building division and head of artificial intelligence, ICT data and statistics division, at the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

The function of the ITU's ICT data and statistics division is to collect, verify and harmonise ICT statistics for about 200 economies worldwide. The ITU collects data from national ICT ministries and regulatory authorities, as well as household ICT data collected from national statistical offices.

According to Teltscher, it is important to include ICT statistics in national statistical development plans. "We have to move beyond the measurement of ICT infrastructure...if we want to understand much more how society and economies are changing based on ICT."

She added: "More and more countries are starting to work together at a national level with different entities that play a role in ICT data production, as well as ICT data users.

"That is really a very good way of ensuring that data are being produced and the right data are being produced.

"We have tried to do that at the international level also and we are trying to bring together policy-makers, research institutes and the ICT industry...this way you keep talking about the subject matter and that will for sure lead to better data production and dissemination."

This week, the ITU held its 14th annual World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators Symposium (WTIS) in Gaborone, Botswana. It brought together government officials, industry leaders and policy-makers to debate new and emerging ICT issues in order to provide strategic guidance to the information society.

The WTIS was also the opportune time for the ITU to launch the much-anticipated 2016 Measuring Information Society report, which features the ICT Development Index, which benchmarks the level of ICT development in 175 countries worldwide.

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