ICT Policy Initiatives in Asia-Pacific

Yoshiki Mikami

Professor, Management and Information Systems Engineering

Nagaoka University of Technology

e-mail: mikami@kjs.nagaokaut.ac.jp

URL: http://kjs.nagaokaut.ac.jp/mikami/

　

INDEX

1. Telecom Infrastructure Overview

   • Fixed Telephone Lines

   • Mobile Network

   • Internet

2. ICT Policy Initiatives

3. e-Commerce

4. e-Governement

5. Digital Signature & PKI

6. e-School & Human Resource Development

7. ICT Manpower: Status, Certificate, Mutual Accreditation

8. Free Software, Open Source Initiatives

9. ICT Industry Development

   • Software & Service Industry

   • Hardware Industry

   • Software Park Initiatives

10. Digital Divide

11. Regional Collaboration

12. Links to National ICT Policy Authorities

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1. Telecom Infrastructure Overview

Improvement in telecom infrastructure has been drastically accelerated during last ten years. It took forty years before Japan's teledensity grew from 1 to 10 (1928-1968). Teledensity of China, however, reached 1 in 1992, and reached 10 in 2000. This can be explained partly by progress of technology and partly by changes in telecom industry structure. Although government monopolies were the common scenes in most countries in Asia-Pacific region at the beginning of 1990s, those public monopolies almost disappeared from the scene in the late 1990s.

Main Telephone Lines per 100 inhabitants

[Source] International Telecommnication Union, Yearbook of Statisitics.

Cellular Subscribers per 100 inhabitants

[Source] International Telecommnication Union, Yearbook of Statisitics.

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Internet

Growth of the Internet has been far more faster than any other media in the history of communications. And time-lags of benchmark years between countries become much shorter than in the days of telegram and telephone.

Growth of the Internet (Number of Hosts)

[Source] Internet Software Consortium (http://www.isc.org/)

Q.1     Compare benchmark years in telecommunication infrastructure development. And realize how your country's improvement has been accelerated. Check EXCEL data and fill blanks below.

Q.2    Describe your country's telecommunication service operators today.

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2. ICT Policy Initiatives

Table     ICT Policy Initiatives Timeline

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3. Electronic Commerce

Globalization of Business Transaction Networks

Global business networks require their own language, consisting of communication protocols, message format/syntax, vocabulary, various codes, etc, in addition to physical connection. Growth of membership to SWIFT, EAN International and ITU illustrate globalization of these connections.

• SWIFT: Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication

• EAN International: Article number Registration authority

• ITU: International Telecommunication Union 

Figure   Growth of Membership to SWIFT, EAN Int'l and ITU

source United Nations WTO ITU SWIFT EAN International

　

Success Stories & Best Practices in Asia-Pacific

1. India's Software Industry
   NASSCOM: National Association of Software and Services Companies
   http://www.nasscom.org/

2. Alibaba.com, China
   http://www.alibaba.com
   "The global trend of importing directly from Chinese manufacturers rather than through trading companies from Taiwan and HK is inevitable as Chinese factories are gaining trading skills and experiences through the help of companies like Alibaba." by Annie Jie Xu, Alibaba.com Business Alliance Manager on May 16, 2002 in Los Angeles (Trade and the Internet - Sourcing Opportunities in Asia)

3. AEOMA EC Best Practices (Asia Oceania Electronic Marketplace Association )
   http://www.aoema.org/EC-Best-Practice/index.htm

Readiness Assessment

APEC EC Steering Group has developed "EC Readiness Assessment Guide", which proposes a set of check points to assess country's readiness for doing business electronically. (see http://www.gipiproject.org/readiness/ )

1. Basic Infrastructure and Technology

2. Access to Necessary Services

3. Current Level and Type of Use of the Internet

4. Promotion and Facilitation Activities

5. Skills and Human Resources

6. Positioning for the Digital Economy (Environment for E-Commerce)

Hong Kong's self assessment based on this Guide.

　

Government Policies

1. Cyber Laws (see 5. below)

2. Awareness Promotion

3. Assistance to SMEs

4. Portal

Table EC Resource Centers in Asia

Singapore	EC Singapore	http://202.42.217.232/
Thailand	EC Resource Center (ECRC)	http://www.ecommerce.or.th/
Malaysia	EC Hub	http://www.ec.com.my/
Japan	ECom	http://www.ecom.or.jp/ecom_e/
Hong Kong
Korea
China

　

Standard Development Organizations (SDOs) and Consortium

ITU, UN/CEFACT, ISO/IEC/JTC1 are working in the area of standardization of information and telecommunication technologies.

The internet related standard development and management. 

Also various type of industry-lead consortia are working to develop application specific standards.

　

Membership status of selected countries to the above organizations.

http://kjs.nagaokaut.ac.jp/mikami/e-gov/stds-consortium/frame.htm

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4. e-Government

e-Government initiatives were launched in several countries. It is expected to play key role in promoting

• better governance / quality service

• efficient government

• catalyze e-commerce

　

Existing ONE-STOP website of Asian government are ...

country	ONE STOP Government site	serving since
Singapore	eCitizen Centre http://www.ecitizen.gov.sg	April 1999
Hong Kong	ESDlife http://www.esdlife.com or http://www.esd.gov.hk	Dec 2000
Taiwan	http://www.gov.tw/ Chinese Only	1999

e-Governments under planning are ...

World e-Government Links
http://www.egovlinks.com/world_egov_links.html

United Nations Online Network in Public Administration and Finance (UNPAN) E-government Portal
http://www.unpan.org/egovernment.asp
　

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5. Digital Signature & Public Key Infrastructure

Digital Signature Laws

Certification authorities (CAs)

• Japan PKI Forum
  http://www.japanpkiforum.jp/E/index.htm

• 　

　

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6. e-School & Human Resource Development

e-School　

country	e-School project
Thailand	School Net Thailand http://www.school.net.th/
Japan

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7. ICT Manpower: Status, Certificates, Mutual Accreditation

SEARCC/SRIG on Professional Standards (SRIG-PS)
Report on the Regional ICT Manpower and Skills Survey 1999-2000
The report reveals profile (age, gender, educational background, annual remuneration, technical competency, etc.) of ICT manpower in eight countries in the region; India, Indonesia, Japan, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Thailand. 

SEARCC/SRIG on Certification (SRIG-CERT)

The group is seeking for mutual accreditation of ICT professional certificates among member societies. Current members are

• Singapore (SCS)

• Hong Kong (HKCS)

• Australia (ACS)

• New Zealand (NZCS)

Bilateral Mutual Recognition Schemes on ICT Professionals

• Japan-Singapore: Media Release (2001/08/24)

• Japan-India: 

• Japan-China:

• Japan-Korea:

Cross-boarder Flow of ICT engineers

• US: The huge absorber: H1-B Visa policy

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8. Free Software, Open Source Initiatives

Use of free software is spreading in developing countries

• Peru
  http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,51902,00.html

• 　

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9. IT Industry Development

Software and Service Industry Demand - Supply (1998, US M$)

[Source]  JISA, NASSCOM, International Data Corporation

Hardware Industry Demand - Supply (1998, US M$)

[Source]  JISA, NASSCOM, International Data Corporation

Software Park Initiatives

Local Industry Computerization

• Singapore's Local Enterprise Computerization Programme
  The Local Enterprise Computerisation Programme (LECP) aims to encourage small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to achieve a higher level of competitiveness through a more effective use of information technology (IT). For more details, see  iDA site ( http://www.ida.gov.sg/ )
  　

IT Hardware Export

• WTO

• Information Technology Agreement

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9. Digital Divide

Global Digital Divide

For more details >> See Mikami's UNU Presentation

　

Related Links

• Digital Opportunity Task Force
  http://www.dotforce.org/

• UNESCO Institute of Statistics (UIS) for literacy, education data
  http://www.uis.unesco.org/

• Divide among Languages and Scripts

  • Universal Declaration of Human Rights
    http://www.unhchr.ch/udhr/navigate/alpha.htm
    The Declaration is translated into more than 330 languages of the World. Most of non-Latin texts, however are presented by image files, not by encoded texts.

  • Multilingual Computing Resources
    http://mlcr.nagaokaut.ac.jp/main/

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10. Regional Collaboration

• e-ASEAN Task Force
  http://www.e-aseantf.org/

• APEC Telecommunication & Information Working Group
  http://www.apectel.org/apec/main.html

• Pan Asian EC Alliance

• Tradelink Electronic Commerce Limited (Hong Kong)

• Singapore Network Services Pte Ltd (SNS) (Singapore)

• Trade‐Van Information Services Company (Taiwan)

• Korea Trade Network (KTNet) (Korea)

• Inforshare Information Technology Development Co. Ltd.(IITD) (China)

ASEAN e-Task Force	APEC

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Thailand	Malaysia	Singapore	Philippines	Indonesia
		iDA	ITECC
China	Korea	Taiwan	Mongolia	Hong Kong SAR
Vietnam	Laos	Cambodia	Myanmar	Brunei
India	Pakistan	Sri Lanka	Nepal	Bangladesh
MIT
Argentina	Brazil	Mexico	Peru	Jordan

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last updated 2002/07/01     © Yoshiki Mikami 2001    mail to Yoshiki Mikami

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