Blessing Olaifa, Abuja
THE Federal Government on Monday called on the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) Study Group to assist African countries to bridge standardisation gaps among network operators and industry players for the transformation of African economies.
The Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr Isa Pantami, said standardisation would prepare the continent for emerging technologies and play key roles in achieving the objective of a better connected Africa and the world in general.
He stated this at the Transcorp Hotel, Abuja, during the opening of the ITU Study Group 13 Meeting.
He said the economic trasformation of the country in line with the agenda of the present administration depend largely on future networks, namely cloud computing, smart cities and software solutions/innovations among others.
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Pantami said: “Without standardisation, it would prevent us from having economies of scale and this can slow down the primary objective of the ITU to have interconnected people and things. To have a successful digital economy, we require global standards to drive and support robust network of technologies, digital platforms and a comfortable level of digital literacy.”
The Executive Vice Chairman, Nigerian Communications Communission (NCC), Prof Umar Danbatta, said standard must be developed for the industry to achieve a resilient and robust future networks, adding that this has become necessary with the evolution of new and emerging technologies.
He added that the technologies could enable African countries take full advantage of service deliveries and ensure that some Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were fully dependent on future networks and their ability to handle the demands of the new technologies.
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