by STAFF WRITER
June 17, 2022
KIGALI, Rwanda, Jun 17, CMC – The Trinidad-based Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU) and the American Registry of Internet Numbers (ARIN) have agreed to strengthen collaboration to enhance the development and growth of the region’s digital economy.
The two agencies have been driving digital transformation in the Caribbean and their announcement here to accelerate joint efforts is aimed at supporting development in areas such as internet number resource autonomy; internet public policy; cybersecurity; domestic connectivity and internet traffic exchange.
CTU Secretary General, Rodney Taylor, and ARIN’s director of Caribbean Affairs, Bevil Wooding, announced the new collaboration on the sidelines of the World Telecommunications Development Conference (WTDC) that ended here on Thursday.
ARIN and the CTU have pledged to strengthen collaboration and ramp up joint activities to support development in digital empowerment of women, youth and entrepreneurs; as well as facilitating an enabling business environment for innovation-driven enterprises (IDEs) in the Caribbean.
“Deepening our long-standing relationship with ARIN, a like-minded organisation, will help accelerate the vision of CARCIOM heads of government to implement a single ICT space in the region; it will also strengthen our efforts to support our member states in addressing digital inequalities and seizing new opportunities that the technology affords,” Taylor said.
He added that the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has proven that digital cooperation is more important now than ever, particularly “because much work still needs to be done to connect the unconnected, increase access to rural communities, and improve the quality, security and resilience of digital services”.
Wooding, who holds responsibility for ARIN’s outreach to Caribbean governments and stakeholder groups, said that on the internet, connectivity and cooperation have always gone hand in hand.
“We connect our communities and countries better when we cooperate, so for ARIN, it is very important for us to work together in the Caribbean with organisations like the CTU, to tackle important issues such as network resilience; domestic internet traffic exchange; cybersecurity, and internet access and affordability,” he said.
He added that in the past, ARIN and the CTU have jointly developed programmes to advance areas that include technical capacity building, particularly among computer network engineers, as well as outreach to the justice sector to raise awareness of the evolving impact of the internet on judicial and legal practices.
Both Taylor and Wooding reiterated their organisation’s commitment to supporting regional efforts to usher the Caribbean fully into the digital age, making it easier for businesses to thrive and citizens to prosper.
CMC/gf/ir/2022
