The importance of digitalization to design and implement public policies centered on people and as a path for sustainable development in Latin America and the Caribbean, highlighted today participants at the inauguration of the Eighth Ministerial Conference on the Information Society in Latin America and the Caribbean that takes place in Montevideo, Uruguay, until this Friday, November 18.
The Conferenceorganized by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (Cepal) together with the Government of the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, through the Agency for Electronic Government and Information Society (Agesic), aims to define a set of of policy priorities at the regional level to promote digital transformation with a vision of sustainable development, within the framework of the Digital Agenda for Latin America and the Caribbean (eLAC 2024).
The inauguration was attended by Rodrigo Ferrés, Deputy Secretary of the Presidency of the Oriental Republic of Uruguay; José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, Executive Secretary of ECLAC; Pablo Ruiz Hiebra, Resident Coordinator of the United Nations in Uruguay, and Hebert Paguas, Executive Director of Agesic.
The Deputy Secretary Rodrigo Ferrés welcomed those present on behalf of the Uruguayan Government, highlighted the role of the state in the design of public policies that take into account the needs of the people and underscored the transversal nature of digital technologies and digitization. “The issues that we will discuss at the meeting, especially digitization, which is progressing more and better, mean very well thought-out instruments, very necessary, but which must be used in the best possible way, taking into account public purposes, the general interest and people’s rights,” he said.
Hebert Paguas from Agesic presented the country’s progress in the different areas of digitization and indicated that these experiences will be a contribution to the Digital Agenda for Latin America and the Caribbean eLAC2024 that is being discussed in Montevideo. “We want more agile services for our country and the region, with people at the center,” stressed Paguas, highlighting the need to advance in digital citizenship and digital transformation.
“Talking about the future is talking about information, science, change at work, the fourth industrial revolution. From UN Uruguay we will work with the Government and all sectors of society on the bets that the country must make to take the definitive leap towards development”, stated, for his part, Pablo Ruiz Hiebra, Resident Coordinator of the United Nations in Uruguay .
In a complex global and regional context, in which multiple crises converge, “digitization is one of the priority areas for the transformation of the development model of Latin America and the Caribbean,” said José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, Executive Secretary of the ECLAC, who pointed out that “in order to move towards a true process of digital inclusion, a set of actions and policies are required to facilitate the use and adoption of digital technologies in all segments of the population, companies and government institutions ”.
Between 2014 and 2023, the region will experience the lowest growth in the last seven decades (0.8%), less than what was registered in the so-called lost decade of the 1980s due to the debt crisis, warned the highest representative of ECLAC . “We must work both to reduce inequality and to create wealth, which goes through productive development policies and digital transformation policies in a very important way,” said José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs and called for enhancing the positive effects of digital technologies and to address the challenges of inequality, privacy, security, competition and data protection.
“The Digital Agenda for Latin America and the Caribbean, eLAC, which is 17 years old today, has generated enormous capacities in terms of dialogue and cooperation and its agreements were crucial to consolidate a common vision on the mechanisms necessary to enhance the impact of technologies digital development issues”, he valued.
After the opening session, the Executive Secretary of ECLAC presented the document A digital path for sustainable development in Latin America and the Caribbean that will be discussed by the representatives of the government, the private sector, the technical community and civil society that participate in the regional meeting.
The senior official explained that the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated digitization in the region and stressed that the State has been a great promoter of digital transformation; however, persistent connectivity gaps condition social inclusion.
In 2021, the average penetration of fixed broadband in households in Latin America and the Caribbean reached almost 62%, which places the region well below other regions such as North America and Europe, which have penetration levels close to 100% and 90%, respectively. The differences are also significant in the case of mobile broadband, which has a penetration of 78% of the population in the region, and 105% and close to 150% in the cases of Europe and North America, respectively.
José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs specified that 1/4 of urban households and 2/3 of rural households still need to be connected. Households not connected in the lowest income quintile, he said, triple those in the highest income quintile in the region.
Currently in the region, half of the young people between the ages of 13 and 25 are “not connected”, 1/3 of the boys and girls between the ages of 5 and 12, and 1/4 of the adults over 66 years of age.
Industrialized countries put digitalization at the center of productive development policies, highlighted José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, who mentioned five areas of action proposed by ECLAC for sustainable and inclusive digitalization in the region: 1) generate enabling conditions ( which implies expanding the coverage of services, ensuring effective universal coverage, speeding up the deployment of advanced mobile networks such as 5G and developing digital skills); 2) develop digital solutions; 3) promote digital transformation (favoring, for example, entrepreneurship and innovation and promoting the digitization of companies); 4) establish digital governance; and 5) strengthen regional cooperation and integration (promoting, among other things, a regional digital market).