By Russell Williams

There has been a lively discussion on a virtual IT forum I follow, which centred on an article in the Jamaica Gleaner which asserted that the relatively high cost of internet access is to blame for holding back ICT development and moves to developing a knowledge based society.

I have read with interest some of the comments and opinions, some supportive and others not. Some of which suggest that the establishment of Internet Exchange Points (IXPs) holds the key to driving down the costs, others strongly dismiss the importance of IXPs in driving down costs. One contributor flatly dismisses the internet as a plausible issue, and to some extent he has a point.

Over the next couple of articles I will not only give my opinion, but would set out my stall so to speak on the issues as I see them.

To a large extent Internet Access and its cost is just the tip of the iceberg. It gets attention because it’s visible; the real issues are much bigger and lie way below the surface and are:

1.Poorly conceived and implemented government policy
2.Lack of investment in developing skills
3.Lack of investment in developing content, including services
4.Lack of accountability for non-delivery or failed performance

The first and the last points are perhaps key and I will touch on these first. Too often a strategy is developed by a politician or technocrat, which seeks to address a technological landscape described in a study from 5 or more years ago. Which in real terms because we’re dealing with technology is almost a generation ago. They develop a strategy based on their priorities within a constrained budget, which then takes another 4 or 5 years to actually begin implementation. Another minister takes over and with the benefit of 20:20 hindsight throws that strategic plan out to develop their own plan based on a newer set of old facts.

What should be done is to gather all stakeholders – non-IT practitioners as well as IT professionals, business leaders, Telco’s and the opposition – and agree on what the future should look like and what we need to enable our people and country to get there; then develop a truly national plan which would be carried out and routinely assessed regardless of which political party is in power.

From my own experience the issue of internet and broadband occupied a lot of my time as I participated on a consultancy for the ECTEL member states back in 2006-07. How many persons have seen the report and its recommendations? We interviewed dozens of people, how many of the NTRC’s and civil servants have sought to look critically at the many recommendations and determine which could be implemented if any?

Having been interviewed how many persons have followed up with the powers that be in their country to determine what became of the study and its recommendations? This speaks directly to the last point and is one I’ve made repeatedly – that we need some clarity and accountability when our governments embark on projects with grant money or borrowed money.

The ECTEL Broadband project back in 2007 recommended the formation of an “OECS” IXP, and here we are in 2011 with a handful in operation in the English speaking Caribbean and nothing more than a healthy debate in many other parts!

Elsewhere, we see funds made available through European Union grants going unspent and returned to Europe! While the majority of us suffer as a result of this criminal mismanagement of resources, who is to be held accountable?

Turning to the need for an IXP, people argue that there is insufficient traffic to justify the creation of one, or that the majority of content being consumed is North American in nature and therefore it wouldn’t make sense.

This thinking is fundamentally flawed, and presupposes that what is or has been will remain the case. Further, this thinking is based on assumptions without any regionally owned or collected facts! Since LIME are the only entity regionally, that may have something like a ‘big picture’ in terms of volumes of internet traffic or content is being consumed regionally. We need an independent arbiter to accurately collect and publish this information. But more on this when I cover IXPs in a later article.

I have commented on the misguided policy and priority of laptop distribution previously, but this is an example of poorly thought out policy. There’s a reason why young people want to be “Like Mike” or accountants, doctors or lawyers or even a hand on a construction site. People can relate to the apparent wealth or income they perceive these professions command. I don’t know many IT entrepreneurs in St. Kitts-Nevis, note I said entrepreneurs not persons employed in IT who wasn’t preoccupied with trying make payroll and or other overheads last week.

I don’t see any of them driving a nice 4×4, Lexus or BMW; indeed some of them are BMW’s – Black Men Walking! Once there are adequate opportunities to earn a good living from being an entrepreneur in the IT sector, the sector will stimulate the youth to adopt and embrace the technology. They would make full and proper use of the school IT Labs and the computer labs presently standing idle in the country’s community centres. It’s no use pointing to the US and heralding Sergey Brin and Larry Page of Google or Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, when entrepreneurs closer to home, those who the young people see everyday are catching their tail! What sort of motivation or message is that sending our young people?

There needs to be an urgent rethink and not just more talk about the importance of ICT and moves to become knowledge based economies in the absence of actions that match the talk is simply the espousing of buzzwords and sound-bites.

I will give my thoughts on IXPs in the region, developing our human capacity and the issue of content in subsequent articles.

Image Courtesy: http://ict-adv-disadv.blogspot.com/

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