Global IT Report - Lanka ranked 65

by Asanga Abeyagoonasekera

Technology is nothing. What's important is that you have faith in people, that they're basically good and smart, and if you give them tools, they'll do wonderful things with them. - Steve Jobs

Free wi-fi with a 100MB limit in urban areas and villages may give the impression of progress in the field of ICT engagement and the public. However, strategic areas remain to be focussed under the government.

Sri Lankan authorities and stakeholders of the ICT industry should focus on the ten pillars of the Global Information Technology report (which was released on April 15). Its important to develop strategies to improve each pillar.

The framework translates into the Network Readiness Index (NRI), a composite indicator made up of four main categories (sub-indexes), 10 subcategories (pillars), and 53 individual indicators distributed across the different pillars.

At this year's NRI of World Economic Forum's Global Information Technology Report 2015, Sri Lanka has been ranked 65th out of 143 countries. Singapore was at the top of the list followed by Finland and certain Nordic countries.

European nations that dominate the leader-board, with seven top 10 places this year.

Singapore is the sole remaining Asian Tiger. Countries such as Estonia, Slovenia, Malaysia and Qatar are at the 20s and 30s.

The report scores nations on four indexes, based on their readiness to exploit new digital technologies, first, the regulatory and business environment, second, the infrastructure, affordability, and skills, third, the use by businesses, people and government, and finally the social and economic impact.

Singapore

The top of the index chart, the Environment sub-index, two pillars measure political regulatory environment and the business innovation environment. The second sub-index, Readiness, has three pillars the infrastructure digital content, affordability and skills.

The third, Usage sub-index has three pillars with individual use, business use and Government use.

The final impact sub-index has two pillars - economic impact and social impact.

Sri Lanka demonstrates high scores on three pillars - affordability, skills and Government usage. In the case of the other pillars, Sri Lanka scores below 5.0. In an example of a case close to home in Asia, Singapore maintains a high score above 5.0 in all ten pillars.

The success of Singapore may be attributed to one of the world's best ranges of government online services and e-participation tools, among other factors. According to the report "Singapore offers the most conducive business and innovation environment worldwide and the second most digital-ready workforce (second, behind Finland).

With such fertile ground, it is not surprising that digital use is so widespread. Singapore has the highest penetration of mobile broadband subscriptions per capita.

However, Internet uptake is surprisingly low. Only three-quarters of the population use the Internet on a regular basis, far lower than leaders Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. This relatively low uptake does not prevent more than half the population being employed in knowledge-intensive jobs, the second highest after Luxembourg." (WEF GIT Report)

Resources

Free wi-fi should have been prioritised. Its step-by-step implementation should ideally begin with schools which lack e-connectivity for student development. The e-school, a project to enable schools with wi-fi internet was terminated soon after the last general election.

Certain schools lacked the resources to sustain this promising venture investing in the future of the nation's youth, ensuring their connectivity to the world.

As we live in a modern technology-driven world, it's important to first connect the village school so that the children could learn from the online material rather than black and white text books. Internet to improve skills is another area the Government could focus on and infrastructure for this is needed with teachers to teach IT.

Despite Sri Lanka's improvement a few places from last year- from 76th to 65th there is much more improvement to be done in sectors such as the number of applications filed under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) per million population.

Under sub index Economic Impact, Sri Lanka has got a value of 0.6 at 79th place while countries such as Japan top the list with a value of above 300. Mongolia has a better score at 75th place with a value of 0.7. The authorities should improve on R&D and innovation.

ICTA is the apex ICT institution of the Government which was set up in 2003 under the leadership of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe.

Prime Minister Wickremesinghe clearly understands the value and importance of developing the ICT industry.

He was keen to develop the BPO industry at that time and this writer was working at Sri Lanka Telecom assisting to setup the Telecom City and the largest BPO, the HSBC outsourcing centre in Rajagiriya.

When the initial presentation to the Prime Minister was made about the BPO industry he was very positive and supportive. Two years of hard work to setup the Telecom City, a massive IT park was shelved after the change of government at that time. Unfortunately, the loss was for the country.

This farsighted initiative would have generated many jobs in this industry and we lost many investors who were ready to invest in this project due to inconsistency of policy.

Another opportunity has opened to rebuild the nation and with it strengthen the ICT industry. A sustained strategy of investment and trust in people will sow the seeds for growth in the ICT innovation sector.