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International Cooperation on Infrastructure
- Regional Projects
- Egypt and the WSIS process
‘International cooperation among all stakeholders is vital in implementation of
the Plan of Action and needs to be strengthened with a view to promoting
universal access and bridging the Digital Divide.’
WSIS Plan of Action, December 2003
Egypt’s continuing success in implementing its initiatives relies heavily on
benefiting from and contributing to regional and international developments in
ICT. Such interaction and cooperation provide a forum for the sharing of best
practices, and nurtures a strong and competitive environment in the region.
Egypt has the potential for huge ICT export within Africa and the Middle
Eastern region, where it can be a world competitor for value services and
products. In addition, international companies are now attracted to Egypt as a
base for their own manufacturing and services exports into to these areas. In
this way the government sees many mutually beneficial possibilities in
partnering and implementation of joint international projects.
The Ministry of International Cooperation and MCIT are
cooperating to provide an indicator unit for economic and financial information
relevant to foreign aid. In addition to this a system for management of local
equivalence and performance evaluation is to be implemented. It will lend
decision making support through measuring efficiency and effectiveness of loan
and grant management technique.
International Cooperation on Infrastructure
Egypt has committed itself to cooperating with the establishment of
international infrastructure projects. Egypt’s privileged geographical location
makes it an international telecommunication hub in the Middle East and African
region. A number of global and regional fibre optic cables have landing points
in Egypt and provide the country with redundant international links and
reliable connectivity to the global Internet.
The first submarine cable between South East Asia, the Middle East and Western
Europe is called the SEA-ME-WE. The second is SEA-ME-WE-II, which was
implemented along the same route, but serving more countries and using digital
fibre optic technology. Also there is the SEA-ME-WE-III cable, with extended
coverage from Europe to Japan, Australia and many other countries in East Asia.
Technical details of the various cable projects are shown in the inset box
opposite.
Furthermore, during the year 2000, Telecom Egypt signed with the Fibre Optic
Link Around the Globe (FLAG) project an agreement, to build a local IP peering
point for FLAG in Egypt. The peering point located in Cairo, directly connects
ISPs to FLAG IP backbone via an STM-4 link on FLAG cable. This agreement
resulted in decreased prices for international Internet connectivity.
Submarine Cable Systems in Egypt
SMW2 Cable System
This is a PDH cable system having a capacity 2 x 595 Mbps. It is a repeater
system connecting between France and Singapore passing through Egypt, and was
put in service in June 1994.
SMW3 Cable System
It is an undersea light wave transmission system use by fibre optics in its
transoceanic undersea application. Sea-Me-We 3 is the longest system in the
world with a total length of 39,000 km. It has two landing points in Egypt with
one in Alexandria and the other in Suez. Its capacity is 55 Gbps and will be 70
Gbps after a second upgrade is completed. The Cable System is a Synchronous
Digital Hierarchy (SDH) compliant system that enables the SDH network element
for transport.
FLAG Submarine Cable System
FLAG is a private submarine cable connecting United Kingdom and Japan in a
network of separate subsystems. Each subsystem comprises two or more terminal
station connected by two fibre pairs. The system is fully Synchronous Digital
Hierarchy (SDH) compatible and complies with ITU-TS standards. The FLAG
submarine cable system has started to be upgraded along some segments from the
capacity of 10 Gbps to 20 Gbps. The segment between UK and Spain is now
operating at 80Gbps.
ALETAR and Berytar Submarine Cable System
This is a fibre cable system for PDH and/or SDH traffic in the Far East. It
comprises of a repeated link between Alexandria in Egypt and Tarsus in Syria
(ALETAR), also the unrepeated Berytar links between Tarsus and Tripoli, and
Tripoli to Beirut.
Satellite Networks
Principal satellite networks are as follows.
Atlantic Satellite, Maddi-1 Earth Station, antenna 32m diameter.
Indian Satellite Maddi-2 Earth Station, antenna 32m diameter.
Arab Sat, Maddi-5 Earth station, antenna 11m diameter.
Maddi-7 Earth station, antenna 11m diameter.
Fibre Optical Terrestrial Links
There are two main fibre optic links that are being used in Egypt. The Egypt to
Sudan link, up to 4 STM1 and upgradeable up to 2.5 Gbps, and a dark fibre link
from Electricity Company in Egypt and Jordan to be used between Telecom Egypt
and JTC.
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Regional Projects
MCIT is determined to remain actively involved in regional developments in
ICT. MCIT is actively participating in several bilateral, regional, and
multilateral activities to foster the development of a strong and competitive
ICT environment in the region. Amongst the schemes detailed below, MCIT is now
encouraging and assisting other countries in the African and Arab region to
implement similar schemes to PC for Community, IT Clubs, and Free Internet.
The NEPAD e-School Initiative
The e-School initiative has become a priority for the New Partnership for
Africa’s Development, in which Egypt is actively involved. More than 60 percent
of Africa’s population consists of people below the age of twenty five, and are
likely to be the ones who are most affected by the digital and knowledge
divide. They also form the basis upon which the future economic activity of
Africa will be built. It is hoped that the implementation of the NEPAD
e-Schools Initiative will ensure that the majority of the people on the
continent will have the skills and knowledge required to function and
participate as equals in the Information Society and Knowledge Economy.
The scheme encourages voluntary participation by countries with participating
parties committing to certain responsibilities, such as coordinated teacher
training and content development. All aspects of the project stress on planning
for sustainability, involving long term maintenance that is internationally
coordinated, and implemented nationally.
The main objective of the NEPAD e-Schools Initiative is to provide ICT skills
and knowledge to primary and secondary school students, enabling them to
function in the emerging Information Society. The initiative will also provide
education relating to health issues, and provide teachers with the necessary
ICT skills. Assistance will be provided in ensuring that school managers are
furnished with the required management and administration tools.
It is intended to achieve these objectives by first implementing
computerisation of the schools, including its administration and management,
providing connectivity, training of trainers, and an establishment of the
school as a Health Point. Special attention will be given to the provision of
electricity including alternative sources such as solar power where necessary.
Adequate physical infrastructure will also be provided to ensure safety and
security of equipment in the schools. Twenty African countries are
participating in the project, including Egypt, with each country having six
schools adopting the scheme.
The African Training Programme
MCIT in coordination with the National Telecommunications Institute (NTI) is
organising a programme to train experts from African countries working in the
field of ICT. During the session of the administration council of the African
Telecom Union (ATU) that took place in April 2003, the issue of building the
capacities of African ICT professionals was raised and thoroughly discussed.
These discussions resulted in the adoption of a resolution detailing this
programme as a regional project initiated by MCIT.
The programme aims at developing human capacities together with transferring
and sharing experiences among experts in African countries in the field of ICT.
The programme targets to train one hundred ICT experts annually, at least two
from each country.
During the first semester of the training programme from 15 April to 8 May
2004, about sixteen trainees from nine African countries participated. The
programme, which was sponsored by MCIT, was tailored to meet some crucial
African requirements and helped in building the capacity of high level ICT
professionals within both the governmental levels as well as the capacities of
technical staff within the private sector. The certificates of the programme
were awarded in the closing ceremony of ITU Telecom Africa 2004 in Cairo. MCIT
is actively working to continue to offer this programme. The next training
session will be in 2006 with partial funding support from CUPA.
The Arab Memory Project
The collective memory of the Arab world is currently facing
unsurpassed challenges. War, social tensions, sweeping modernisation, and
globalisation are but a few examples. Physical aspects of erosion include
natural catastrophes such as floods and fires are also undermining the Arab
collective memory and accordingly its self image. Several efforts have been
made to preserve this heritage, but none thus far have been comprehensive or
collective in their goals or implementation strategies.
The proposed Arab Memory Project’s main goal is to reinforce Arab ethos through
highlighting the truly shared Arab Heritage. It proposes to achieve this by
making use of the latest ICT developments in digitising the Arab Heritage, and
use Internet portals as a main mode of transmission and dissemination as well
as electronic and paper publishing. The project will establish a well
integrated network of heritage and IT specialist entities in every Arab country
to gather, digitise, and formulate the output of each country.
The most important success factor in the project however is the strategic
alliance between various organisations with both international and regional
outlook and who have an established history in documenting, preserving and
disseminating culture. UNESCO are the anticipated managing agency for the
project and the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development (AFESD) the main
funding agency. Bibliotheca Alexandrina represented by the Centre for
Documentation of Cultural and Natural Heritage (CultNat), will be the executing
and coordinating body for the project.
Plans are in place to widen the scope of the Arab Memory Project to embrace the
digitisation of different aspects of heritage. These include manuscripts, old
photographs, documentary films, government and national archives, music, maps,
fossils, flora and fauna, and oral and intangible folk traditions. Hence an
interdisciplinary approach to the implementation of the project becomes
imperative. And to reinforce this concept it is proposed that the agreement to
the project be signed and endorsed by the three organisations above.
Accordingly, the Arab Memory of the World Project will set out to preserve the
collective memory of the Arab world for future generations. Its mandate is
digital documentation of our cultural and natural heritage in its tangible and
intangible manifestations.
The Arab Digital Library
Several Arabic institutions individually resorted to the execution of
Arabic library digitisation projects. Despite the diversified nature of such
projects, all were local experiments not contributing to solving many
information handling infrastructures in a unified proper way between Arabic
countries. The need for uniting efforts in the intention of building an Arabic
Digital Library was a pressing need to reach a level capable of fulfilling the
Arabic, international, and Islamic needs in handling bibliographic and Arabic
information resources.
The Arab Digital Library project hopes to build an infrastructure comprised in
providing Arabic technical tools called upon by the Arabic library long ago,
and which neither scientific nor academic institutions are capable of providing
on the local level of each country. However, the spread of electronic networks
has made possible the use of information technology in providing systems for an
accurate and fast information flow coupled with effort saving and
induplication. These libraries will be linked and an electronic portal
constructed for the Arabic library for provision of information services. The
project is made up of three components as follows.
The success of this project calls for the participation of several authorities
and institutions involved within the library world, such as national libraries
and also the contribution of authorities in varying efforts. In addition,
several smaller scale libraries are to be linked to the project to create
awareness of the use of developed standards and implementing the regulations
and table use in an attempt to unite many bibliographic preparation operations.
Partaking institutions will be divided into founding, participating, and
affiliated institutions. Such division guarantees the project success, the
initiative spread and the marketing of its services which will be priced
according to the needs of the Arabic and international markets. The project
execution duration is five years and needs the completion of three phases to
reach full performance level and guarantee continuity as follows:
Phase I: This one year study phase will include the
development of a comprehensive study of the current situation and execution
techniques and steps on the Arab level.
Phase II: A two year phase, during which the construction of a
knowledge portal and the finalisation of developing international standards,
Arabic bases, categorisation plans and reference databases for some of the
principle system components.
Phase III: A two year phase through which services will be
delivered and developed publications, work guidelines, and unified Arabic
standards will be distributed. This phase is expected to demonstrate a return
on investment of the project and an economic vehicle to financially support the
continuity of the project. This is also the assessment and evaluation phase.
Egypt and the WSIS process
Egypt's involvement in the WSIS process has moved along two complementary
paths. The first is actively engaging in setting up the international agenda
for the ICT sector, including priorities and actions that should enjoy
international attention and consensus. The second is acting effectively upon
such recommendations on the national, regional and international levels, as
well as continuously assessing achieved progress. The special nature of the two
phased summit was an excellent opportunity for such effort. Spanning over the
period of a number of years, the WSIS allowed Egypt a full chance to reconsider
its agenda and determine its positions on ICT issues in the global arena.
Egypt's involvement in the WSIS process offered Egypt first hand opportunity to
grasp international trends and difficulties in most issues related to the
information society, and engage in attempts to resolve or reconcile many of
such issues. This process has triggered national coordination, as well regional
and international cooperation. Egypt has also been selected as a member of a
working group on Internet Governance in an effort to begin a dialogue between
parties over fair Internet use.
Through participation in global preparatory communications, hosting Arab
regional conferences, and attending African regional meetings, as well as
taking an active part in thematic gatherings, Egyptian experts have enriched
and have been enriched by the ongoing international dialogue on Information
Society.
Debt relief featured heavily in the discussions at the Pan -Arab Regional
Dialogue: In Preparation to WSIS 2005 Conference in Cairo, May 2005. The Debt
Swap Mechanism provides a debt for development exchange, and particularly
involves enhancing local economic development with special emphasis on ICT for
development. Egypt has been able to negotiate four bilateral Debt Swap
agreements with the governments of France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland. In
engaging in these agreements, all governmental parties looked to find practical
and feasible ways to alleviate Egypt’s bilateral debt that has constituted a
significant drain on the country’s resources.
International Financial Mechanisms
In accordance with the WSIS of Geneva 2003, the Secretary General of the
UN was asked to create a task force to study the issue of financial mechanism
for ICT and present a report to facilitate the discussions on the subject in
preparation for phase II of WSIS. The brief was to ensure that all financial
mechanisms should be fully exploited, and a thorough review of their adequacy
in meeting the challenges of ICT for development should be undertaken.
Strong emphasis was placed by Egypt on initiatives that have been undertaken to
reduce outstanding debt and invite further national and international measures
in that regard, such as debt cancellation. Particular attention is being given
to the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries initiative. It is intended that these
initiatives would release more resources that may be used for financing ICT for
development projects.
Debt Swap is considered to be as an existing and feasible source of funding,
and currently further exploration of this mechanism and merits is being
undertaken to aid the financing of ICT in development. The Debt Swap Mechanism
is a tool whereby a donor swaps a debt in return for the recipient paying it
back in instalments for the funding of particular projects. In the process of
debt swapping, a counterpart fund is created and its funds are endorsed in one
of the major banks. The agreement is based on the recipient paying in agreed
instalments the sum of principal and interest on loan during a particular
period of time. The swap fund takes places through Overseas Development
Assistance (ODA).
The swap fund is based on a management committee and a technical committee. The
first approves policies and line of progress, as well as projects and verifies
project achievements. A technical committee recommends projects to the
management committee. The mechanism has been applied bilaterally in a number of
countries including Egypt, Ecuador, and Costa Rica. The mechanism has been
successfully illustrated by the agreement that was signed between Egypt and
Italy in 2001, where $149.09 million of Egypt interest and principle payments
for its Italian outstanding debt is being used over a period of five years for
development and environment programs focusing on rural and unprivileged
locations in Egypt. The programmes include a total of fifty three projects that
addresses various sectors of the economy.
The benefits of the mechanism include the fact that resources exist already in
the form of debts that shall be reimbursed. There are no new funds, but new
allocations, since existing funds are channelled as appropriate. Both recipient
and donors of the schemes are playing a key role in monitoring the
implementation.
The mechanism is not dedicated to ICT only, but covers an array of
developmental projects depending on the recipient national priorities and in
light of the donor's fields of interests. This mechanism would allow for the
mainstreaming of ICTs into different other developmental activities, in the
activities of both recipient and donor, in addition to the possibility of
dedicating certain allocations to infrastructure projects.
The system is characterised by a high level of coordination and cooperation
between donor and recipient. The swap fund is a sharing of responsibility of
establishing the information society between the recipient country and
international community, in accordance with the spirit of the WSIS Declaration
of Principles. The debt swap addresses two issues simultaneously, resolving
debt issue and contributing to the global information society that is in the
interest of all countries. Egypt is documenting its successful debt for
development swap experience to allow countries with similar circumstances to
make use of this important funding mechanism.
Internet Governance
Whilst no definite agreement was reached regarding Internet Governance (IG) at
the first phase meetings of the WSIS 2003, the issue has emerged as one of the
main policy issues to be discussed before and during the second phase in Tunis
2005. Internet governance defines itself as the management of unique and scarce
Internet resources, such as IP addresses, domain names, AS numbers, and
protocol numbers. Other aspects of IG include the control of SPAM, illegal or
harmful content, as well as emerging topics like multilingualism and Internet
scaling issues. IG also extends in some circles to the Digital Divide, the
harmonisation of global policies related to education, Internet exchange
points, security frauds, intellectual property rights, and data and consumer
protection.
There are two conflicting perspectives regarding IG that will try to be
resolved in the near future. The first belief is that IG matters are primarily
concerned with technical and operational issues and do not require government
intervention, but rather should continue to be coordinated only by different
technical groups and business organisations. The other side of the argument
proposes that IG includes not only technical resource management issues but
also other policy matters that fit under sovereignty rights of governments. It
is generally believed that IG needs more multilateral cooperation and the
management of the Internet should be brought under the umbrella of an
international organisation. Egypt’s position with IG revolves around the
persistent need to review the mechanisms that used to govern the Internet over
the past years and consider making the necessary adjustments as required. The
government wishes to see a productive dialogue between parties to reach a
common agreement to move Internet use forward in a positive way.
Egypt’s Participation in the WSIS
During Phase I of the WSIS, Egypt participated in the following events:
- African Regional Preparatory Conference: 25-30 May 2002, Bamako
(Mali).
- PrepCom-1: 1-5 July 2002, Geneva (Switzerland).
- First Regional Preparatory Conference for Western Asia, Beirut,
4-6 February
2003.
- PrepCom-2: 17-28 February 2003, Geneva (Switzerland).
- Intercessional Meeting between PrepCom-2 and PrepCom-3: 15-18
July 2003,
Paris (France).
- PrepCom-3: 15-26 September 2003, 10-14 November 2003, 5-6
December
2003, and 9 December 2003, Geneva (Switzerland).
- All of Bamako Bureau Meetings.
- Arab Working Group on WSIS meetings.
Egypt also hosted the Pan Arab Regional Conference on
WSIS (Arab African Dialogue) between 16 and 18 June 2003 in Cairo and
participated in formulating the Arab Action Plan and African Action Plan and
WSIS Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action. Egypt attended WSIS Phase I
with a high level delegation headed by President Mubarak.
During Phase II of the WSIS, Egypt participated in the following events:
- African Regional Preparatory Conference: 2-4 February 2005,
Accra (Ghana).
- PrepCom-1: 24-26 June 2004, Hammamet (Tunisia).
- First Regional Preparatory Conference for Western Asia: 22-23
November
2004, Damascus (Syria).
- PrepCom-2: 17-25 February 2005, Geneva (Switzerland).
- PrepCom-3: 19- 30 September 2005, Geneva (Switzerland).
- Arab ICT Strategy Formulation Working Group Meetings.
- Arab Working Group on WSIS meetings.
Egypt hosted the Pan Arab Conference on WSIS
Phase II: An Arab Regional Dialogue: 8-10 May 2005, Cairo (Egypt), and
participated in formulating Arab Action Plan and African Action Plan for this
phase.
Egypt is a member of the following groups:
- WSIS Bureau of the Second Phase
- Group of the Friends of the Chair
- Working Group on Internet Governance
- Executive Bureau for the Arab Telecommunications and Information
Council of
Ministers (Chairman)
- Arab Working Group on WSIS (Vice Chairman)
- Arab ICT Strategy Formulation Working Group
- Bamako Bureau
- African Ministerial Committee
Egypt’s Commitment to the Way Forward
In order to assure the sustainability of the WSIS process after the completion
of its Tunis phase, plans will be established or will have already been put in
place to implement a mechanism for the Geneva and Tunis Plans of Action. The
plans will be based upon continuing cooperation between the Egyptian government
and all concerned stakeholders, with an aim to achieve the development goals of
the Millennium Declaration.
For each action line detailed in the Geneva and Tunis Plans of Action, the
Egyptian government intends to bring together the necessary teams of
stakeholders to facilitate their implementation. It is intended that the plans
are executed hand in hand with UN bodies or specialised agencies leveraging on
their expertise, and working where possible within Egypt’s existing resources.
Following the second phase of the WSIS, Egypt appreciates that to build an
Information Society will require unremitting effort. Egypt is committed to keep
fully engaged, nationally, regionally and internationally, to ensure
sustainable follow up to the implementation of agreements and commitments
reached during WSIS process and its Geneva and Tunis summits. The government
and its ministry plans carefully to consider the multifaceted nature of
building the Information Society, effective cooperation among all stakeholders,
respect for their mandates, and leveraging on their expertise.
Introduction
The
Foundation for the Information Society
e-Access
Innovation
Capacity Building
Enabling
Environment
Industry
Development
ICT
Applications: Benefits in All Aspects of Life
International and Regional Cooperation
Conclusion
References
Appendix
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