Media Center

Press Release

At OAS, Experts Debate Hemispheric Cooperation to Promote Access to Technology, in Preparation for Summit of the Americas

Experts in technology and telecommunications today debated at the headquarters of the Organization of American States (OAS) in Washington, DC, “hemispheric cooperation to promote access to technology,” in the first of a series of round tables in preparation for the VI Summit of the Americas in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia.

The Secretary General of the OAS, José Miguel Insulza, inaugurated the event, asserting that all the peoples of the continent “are partners in our development” and that progress in Latin America and the Caribbean depends on what the governments of the region do on issues of great importance, such as access to technology, which seeks to achieve greater regular access by many more sectors of society to information and knowledge.

“I don’t want to know if this is or not the decade of Latin America, I want to know what we should do to make it so,” said the head of the OAS. “And that is why the issues of infrastructure, such as poverty reduction, diversity, distribution of income, public security, and of course the subject of technology will be at the center of our debate at this Summit,” to be held April 13 and 14, 2012.

“We live in a new society in which the enterprises that are most highly valued in the world are those that deal with information technology,” said the head of the continental Organization. “And what we want to do is find out how through these new technologies we can transform our education, improve our health, improve also the activity of the public sector—transparency as well as the quality of decision making—and how enterprises also can improve their effectiveness,” he continued.

The 39th Policy Round Table of the OAS featured the participation of Jodi Hanson Bond, Vice President of the Americas for the international division of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce; Marcelo D’Agostino, Manager of Knowledge and Communication Management at the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO); and Carlos Argüello, Founder and Director of Studio C, a state-of-the-art computer animation and visual effects studio based in Guatemala. The event was moderated by Peter Hakim, President Emeritus of the Inter-American Dialogue.

Jodi Hanson Bond placed emphasis on the role that governments must play to improve access to technology of their populations and further the socioeconomic development of countries. “In the last decade, and especially in the last five years, there has been a growing interest by governments on technology and telecommunications, and many countries have created secretariats to address these issues,” he recalled.

Nevertheless, he noted that “investing in technology is not enough without considering some factors such as sustainability and training.” “Improving access to the tools of technology will not by itself achieve the necessary socioeconomic development, but rather the countries must focus their efforts on how to implement and use the technology,” she added.

Marcelo D’Agostino explained the use of “e-health” technology developed by PAHO and the important role governments play in implementing it. “The only entity capable of implementing an “e-health” project at the national level and reducing disparities that exist in access is the government, because it depends on no other institution,” he asserted.

The PAHO representative recalled that “the positive perspective we have today is that technologies and access to the Internet are some of the few things we can say will not go backwards; they only tend to improve. The challenge of governments and international organizations is to know how to position themselves and use them.”

On the subject of the rapid advance of technology and its complexity, Carlos Argüello, of Studio C, said the region has “a lot of young talent,” and that “it is not a matter of technology having become more difficult, but that it exists in a different form.” “Before we had structures in which one person had the knowledge and distributed that knowledge, but now it is completely different, knowledge is everywhere,” he held.

In reference to the innovative work already carried out in Latin American countries with the most advanced technology, Argüello said that “the transparency ceiling has been broken,” or the barrier that impeded Latin American youth from dreaming with working on a Hollywood film. “I think that is one of the most important things this generation has done for future generations,” he said.

At the closing of the Round Table, Ambassador Jaime Girón, Coordinator of the VI Summit of the Americas, recalled that governments in the region have the duty to improve access to technology, a responsibility shared with the private sector and one in which “it is also important that the financial organizations of the Hemisphere participate, as well as civil society organizations and the citizenry in general.” “This is a task for everyone, some because we can contribute, others because we must be ready to receive and share,” he concluded.

A gallery of photos of the event is available here.

For more information, please visit the OAS Website at www.oas.org.

Reference: E-010/12