A three-day ICT/BPO international conference opened Wednesday in Balaclava, northern Mauritius, with 250 international participants, including IT Ministers of Namibia, Swaziland and Uganda as well as high-level government officials from Malawi and Angola, in attendance.
A PANA Correspondent reports that the conference is organized by the Mauritian Information and Communication Technology Ministry in collaboration with the Board of Investment and Extensia Ltd.
Opening the conference, the Mauritian ICT Minister, Tassarajen Pillay Chedumbrum, said that Mauritius intends to position itself as a real ICT hub in the region.
“This has always been the very identity of Mauritius – this is an island that was born out of international trade and global economic progress,” he pointed out.
Saying that ICT is inextricably linked to youth, the minister said “young people, arriving every year on the job market are widely recognized as the most innovative people in modern society.
“What they need is just the opportunity to engage and interact with the online world. Innovation and progress, new ideas, new applications have always happened through the fresh imagination and relentless energy of the young”, the minister observed.
Chedumbrum also elaborated on ICT as an opportunity for a country to spur productivity and unleash innovation while also raising new forms of risk and security challenges.
An African ICT Ministers roundtable focusing on the state of the ICT/BPO industry, present and future opportunities and challenges and business collaboration meetings is also scheduled during the conference.
