UN agency provides technology training for Asia-Pacific officials

Asia-Pacific policymakers are undergoing a new information and communication technology (ICT) training workshop run by the United Nations, aimed at using ICTs to achieve social and economic development goals as well as bridging the digital divide.

The programme for government officials contains three modules of study: the linkage between ICT applications and development; ICT for development policy, process and governance; and e-government applications.

The four-day ICT workshop, being held on the South Pacific’s Cook Islands from 2 to 5 September, has been customized to suit the Pacific island context by the UN Asian and Pacific Training Centre for Information and Communications Technology (UN-APCICT).

Participants will examine the connection between ICT and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) through case studies of ICT applications in key sectors of development in the Pacific.

This is the first time that the UN-APCICT, a subsidiary of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), has held such an event in the Pacific region, and the workshop is running parallel with the PacINET 2008, an annual regional conference on the use of ICT in the Pacific Islands.