Brussels, 2/10/2014 (Agence Europe) - A high-level Euro-Mediterranean meeting on the digital economy attended by the commissioner responsible for this dossier, Neelie Kroes, Jordanian Minister for ICT Azzam Sleit, Secretary General the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) Fathallah Sijilmassi, and representatives from the 43 member countries of the organisation, as well as from development banks and telecom regulators, took place in Brussels on Tuesday30 September. The meeting produced a joint declaration affirming “the joint commitment to the digital economy” and underlined that the digital economy would “remain an irreplaceable social and economic development tool and factor for growth and employment on both sides of the Mediterranean”.
The task set for this meeting was to ensure follow-up to the meeting that took place in Cairo in 2008 and which advocated “stronger commitment” to a “EUROMED information society” by “stepping up cooperation in areas such as network connections, the digital divide, internet governance, research, multilingual electronic content, online health services and sciences. The parties are also committed to enhancing exchanges between national telecommunications regulators with regard to regulatory frameworks”. This commitment has already led to the setting up of the Euromed regulators group (EMERG), in Malta in July 2008.
It was pointed out that ICT “is still an important source of economic growth and jobs on the two sides of the Mediterranean”. Commissioner for the Digital Agenda Neelie Kroes said that the European Commission was determined to “promote a fair, modern, open, competitive and transparent market for communications, an ICT connected research environment and open and dynamic internet use for all”. She called for “sharing of experiences and learning from one another”. A series of recommendations, concrete tasks and ideas for common projects was included in the joint declaration (published online).
There has been no official indication as to the scale of participation at the meeting, particularly by Arab partners, given that they decided initially to cut the number of representatives as a political gesture in response to the recent conflict in the Gaza Strip (see previous issues). (FB)