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By ITU News

The ITU Regional Office for Asia and Pacific covers quite a diverse region, which has its unique challenges and opportunities, says Ioane Koroivuki, Regional Director of the ITU Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific.

During an interview at the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference 2018 (PP-18) held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, he described the work of the ITU Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific.

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Since the last Plenipotentiary Conference in 2014, the ITU Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific worked on five regional initiatives, aimed at harnessing the benefits of ICTs for Member States.

These initiatives have focused on building infrastructure, providing services that would go over that infrastructure, ensuring policy and regulation evolve in tandem with the technology, making sure the networks are secure and resilient, and emergency telecommunications.

“Technology is evolving very quickly and … policy and regulation needs to keep up [with] that as well.”

The office’s new set of initiatives over the next four years will continue the work stream set over the last four years, says Koroivuki.

Koroivuki listed upcoming events in the region. “First up is we have a regional development forum. This is key to a planning process within the region.”

“We [also] have a regulators roundtable where we bring all the regulators from the region and sit them over two days and then we thrash out all the issues that are related to regulation.” He added: “Technology is evolving very quickly and … policy and regulation needs to keep up [with] that as well.”

Furthermore, the Global Regulators Symposium will be held in Vanuatu in 2019. Said Koroivuki, “Member States will get to experience the Pacific, but more importantly how difficult it is to get to the Pacific…. When you look at the Pacific, we are just dots floating in the ocean…. I think it’s a good experience to look at perspectives from small-island developing states.”

“Right now … we need to… ensure that we reach the unreached, bank the unbanked and, of course, keep everyone connected,” he said.

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https://news.itu.int/itus-regional-initiatives-bringing-the-benefits-of-icts-to-the-asia-and-pacific-region/