New Vision Online : Uganda, Egypt seal ICT agreements

New Vision Online : Uganda, Egypt seal ICT agreements

By VISION REPORTER

THE Egyptian ministry of information and communication technology (ICT) has signed eight letters of intent with the ICT ministry to build a smart technology village and establish a cyber security facility.

“We want to develop a strong partnership that will be a model for Africa,” said Dr. Tarek Kamil, the Egyptian minister of ICT at the meeting with the local ICT industry leaders last week.

Among the areas of support and cooperation will be training 3,000 graduates on practical skills, using ICT for documentation of culture and national heritage, establishing business process outsourcing facilities, upgrading training institutions and establishing computer emergency response teams.

Uganda’s business process outsourcing industry is yet to kick off on a massive scale although the country churns out close to 1,000 graduates from its universities annually.

This number could be absorbed in the sector because of its sheer ability to employ large numbers.While Uganda has steadily enhanced its ICT skills base through education, it is yet to get to the stage of focusing on innovation and exports of the sector products to earn large revenues.

This is because of a lack of clear sector leadership and direction to kick-start the several good industry proposals.
“We think that we have resources on both sides to help us on what we agree upon,” said Kamil in Kampala.
Egypt is one of the world’s fastest growing ICT states.

ICT minister Aggrey Awori said the country would shift into a knowledge economy. “The e-waste policy is being drafted and several cyber laws were recently passed. We are in the process of immigrating from analogue to digital. Our target is 2012,” said Awori.