Leaping into 2006

A quick introduction - you can find out more about me from www.adrian.co.za - I have been involved in South Africa's ICT sector for over 20 years. In that time, I have learned a couple of things - the more grey hair (or lack thereof) you have, the more respect you get from people raised with traditional family values; and the more one tries to unite the local ICT community, the harder it becomes.

Is that because the typical ICT sector decision-maker does not have traditional family values, and therefore rejects the wisdom of the older generation? That's a question that can be debated in the larger context of the challenges that I want to address.

The core issue that I want to debate is why our ICT industry has not created effective representation structures, to benefit the entire sector and the South African economy. Back in 1999/2000, the Canadians and our Departments of Communications and Trade & Industry spent a few million Rand on the South Africa IT Industry Strategy Project (SAITIS). the project conducted an enormous amount of original research and provided some good pointers for opportunities into the future.

5 or more years on, the only visible remnant of the project is the SAVANT programme at the dti (www.savant.org.za), which started as a partnership between government and private sector to promote South Africa's capacity as a source of ICT products and services, intended to reduce the trade deficit of some R20 billion in the sector. Now without the private sector contribution, the SAVANT programme is little more than a web site and a newsletter.

Back in 2002, through NEDLAC, an ICT Sector Jobs Summit process was started and the end of 2004 saw the ICT Sector Summit Agreement signed by the four social partners (business, labour, government and civil society). It contains many laudable intentions about the retention and creation of jobs in the sector but absolutely nothing has been done to turn those intentions into action. Why? Because the sector is fragmented and no mandated leadership exists in any of the partners to drive the agreement forward. The key recommendation of the Summit process is that a National ICT Council (NICTC) be formed, to overcome the divisions, but (so far) nothing has been done to create such a body.

From 2003 through 2005, the ICT Empowerment Charter Working Group (ICTECWG) and its related Task Team laboured long and hard to develop and agree the BEE Charter for the sector (see www.ictcharter.org.za). Insofar as it was possible to do so, they called together the opinions of every available stakeholder on many occasions, to arrive at a reasonable consensus. The final draft was amended (watered down?) to comply with the guidelines of government but has since been stalled, as government has yet to finalise the ruling Codes of Good Practice. The delay means that whatever goodwill and common purpose was shared by the stakeholders over that 2-year period has now dissipated, as the parties have no reason to remain united in this particular goal.

In all these initiatives, the lack of a driving force to take effective action means that events overtake the purpose, leaving a trail of wasted effort and resources and a resistance to further participation. I can go on giving examples of good ideas going to waste. They are all affected by the same root cause - fragmentation.

We talk about the ICT sector as though it is an homogenous entity - perhaps like mining, or oil, or agriculture. In practice, though, it covers an enormous range of entities, from Telkom/Vodacom to one-person operators offering technical services. It stretches from broadcasting (SABC, Multichoice), through telecommunications (satellite, broadband, mobile) to programming, networks, hardware and software supply...and more. And, of course, convergence of technologies is blurring the distinction between the various products and services. That influence alone should be pushing us towards consolidation of strategy and policy - convergence, if you will.

How to achieve it? Form the NICTC - driven by the President's Office, mandated to have executive power to coordinate the various government departments that have a stake in the use of ICTs to lubricate the economy and enable serive delivery. Use that executive power to call together the myriad industry bodies and facilitate their consolidation into as few in number as possible. That will prevent the dilution of resources that has prevented any one of the bodies from becoming a dominant force. Need an example? Look to India and the effectiveness of NASSCOM (www.nasscom.org)...

South Africa has the opportunity to host the World Congress on Information Technology in 2010. However, the bid for this US$10m exercise must be submitted by February 28 2006 - and we have not even got the funding to cover the bid preparation!

Can we achieve a result? Can we prove that "unity is strength"? Or do we go on looking after Number One and turning our backs on the enormous opportunities for this wonderful country that would flow from a vibrant and coordinated technology sector?