Tuesday 27 May 2008,

Geneva

CSTD Eleventh Session

Some Suggestions for Resolutions

Dr. Francis Muguet (ENSTA) mostly as a continuation of the proposals of the WSIS-Finance and WSIS-SI Civil Society Working groups

( suggestions in italic blue )

Draft Resolution for adoption by the Council¹

The Commission on Science and Technology for Development recommends to the Economic and Social Council the adoption of the following draft resolution:

B. Success of and shortcomings in the implementation of WSIS outcomes so far

13. Welcomes the success of the Internet Governance Forum, its multi-stakeholder approach and its innovative platform;

14. Welcomes progress towards developing multilingual capabilities on the Internet, particularly the discussions within ICANN regarding the introduction of Internationalized Domain Names;

15. Acknowledges the efforts of the Partnership for measuring ICT for development to develop new indicators, especially in the field of ICTs and education but notes the lack of indicators to measure progress towards achieving the targets as set out in part B of the Geneva Plan of Action

16. Acknowledges the efforts of the Regional Commissions in the coordination of WSIS-implementation, in capacity building and measuring of ICTs;

17. Acknowledges the efforts of all Action Line Facilitators to organize meetings of all Action Lines and commends specifically ITU and UNESCO for their efforts as lead Facilitators and conveners of the Action Line Facilitator’s meetings;

18. Observes that the architecture for WSIS implementation as defined in the Geneva Plan of Action and the Tunis Agenda for the Information society is rather complex.

18. Observes that despite the efforts of the Action Line Facilitators, the principle of Action Line Facilitation set out in the Geneva Plan of Action and the Tunis Agenda has encountered difficulties in involving participation of all stakeholders;

20. Observes that no assessment mechanisms have been implemented for the first part of the Tunis Agenda entitled : Financial mechanisms for meeting the challenges of ICT for development

21. Observes that there is an overlap of the WSIS assessment mandate and the traditional mandate of CSTD concerning e-sciences.

Recommendations

19. Recommends that the international community preserves the Internet Governance Forum as a multi-stakeholder discussion forum focussed on public policy issues related to internet governance and avoid duplication with the WSIS action line implementation process

20. Recommends that assessment mechanisms should be established for the first part of the Tunis Agenda entitled : Financial mechanisms for meeting the challenges of ICT for development, and should be explored the creation of Assessment lines such as

A1: Official Development Assistance ODA
A2: Multi-stakeholder Partnerships
A3: Innovative Financial Mechanisms
A4: Infrastructure and International Interconnection costs

21 Invites UNCTAD in its capacity as CSTD secretariat to start consultations towards the designation of facilitators for the Tunis Assessment lines.

22 Recommends that the implementation of C7 e-science action line should be coordinated closely with the CSTD in its traditional mandate

23. Invites Action Lines facilitators to start open inclusive multi-stakeholder consultations in order to find a format for the Action Lines facilitation meetings next year that would offer a higher global visibility, and that would empower more stalkeholders to mobilize financial resource to attend,

20. Encourages the collaboration among all stakeholders, including international organisations with regard to multilingualization of the internet

21. Recommends the creation of benchmarks and indicators in order to track progress towards the attainment of the specifics goals and targets set out in part B of the Geneva Plan of Action;

22. Recommends that Action Line Facilitators, in cooperation with all stakeholders, should establish milestones, deadlines and calendars for their Action Line, taking into account the WSIS outcome documents;

23. Stresses the need to develop a set of ICT impact indicators at the household and community level in order to deepen the understanding of the relation between ICTs and the development agenda and to measure the effect of ICTs on empowerment, increased opportunities and increased security of poor people;

24. Recommends that Action Line Facilitation should be reviewed by all Action Line Facilitators in cooperation with all stakeholders, so as to make the facilitation process more effective, and invites all Action Line Facilitators, especially ITU, UNESCO and UNDP to consider the reallocation and the clustering of Action Lines;

25. Recommends the introduction of electronic working tools like mailing lists, web 2.0 applications, observatories and clearing house models in order to enhance multi-stakeholder participation;

26. Recommends further that in the reporting process to the CSTD Secretariat as set out in Resolution 2007/8, Action Line Facilitators could make themselves a first assessment of the progress achieved, but also of the difficulties encountered, by all stakeholders on the commitments and recommendations contained in their respective Action Line at regional and international level and make proposals for possible action to the CSTD, whenever necessary;

27. Invites all actors and institutions involved in the implementation of and follow-up to WSIS to further clarify their respective roles and strengthen the mutual information about and complementarity of their work in order to make the most effective use of the resources available for the implementation of and follow-up to WSIS.