Address by Minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni (RSA) at the G20 Digital Economy Ministers Meeting, Bali – Indonesia,
Thank you, Chairperson,
I would like to express South Africa’s appreciation of the Presidency of the Indonesia which drew the world’s attention to people centered connectivity and of course the choice of venue for this meeting. I must equally express our disappointment that we could not reach consensus on the text of the Declaration. But South Africa, given its history, is very conscious of the role the system of true multi-laterism can play in promoting freedom, human rights, and justice for all people equally. However, it is the same geo-political system that continues to neglect the on-going plight of the people of Palestine and Western Sahara amongst others.
Coming back to the agenda of this meeting,
Technology is changing everything, how we work and how we live. We therefore have the responsibility to continue to use technology as a primary catalyst for change in the world that should advance accessible public services, inclusive growth, and sustainable development. The Covid-19 pandemic exposed the negative impact of the digital divide in human development in particular the poor.
We define digital divide as
“The difference between people with optimal conditions to properly use ICT in their daily lives and those who do not have access to them or who do not know how to use them.”
In South Africa and majority of the developing world, in particular in Africa, where the poor remained unconnected, the poor were severely marginalised during the COVID-19 pandemic because they were excluded from accessing basic services such as education, health and ability to work. It is for this reason that we prioritised and concluded the licensing of the high demand spectrum and also secured the commitment of our telecommunications regulator to ensure that the Frequency Spectrum licence holders contribute towards the national broadband penetration objectives by connecting key public institutions such as schools, health facilities, traditional authorities, etc. In addition, this year we will finalise the roadmap towards the deployment of 4G and 5G networks including to rural towns. We continue to work to attain the objectives of our South Africa Connect programme to ensure that we attain universal access to the internet by 2024.
We are further extending email addresses to all learners/ students in public schools and their parents as part of a requirements of basic e-learning.
Like most of Africa, South Africa has a youthful population. We have witnessed numerous demonstrations of the creativity and the innovative nature of young people in the ICT space. It is essential that we invest significantly to provide our youth with access to modern training, skill sets and formal education. To achieve this, our Department of Basic Education has introduced robotics and coding as school subjects in primary and high schools. At present, learners in over a thousand schools are designing and producing robots both for gaming and to complete tasks the learners find tedious for human completion. Next year, learners in these and additional schools that will join this category will compete in a National Robotics Development Challenge.
The teaching of robotics and coding in our public schools will further be enhanced by our soon to be launched Artificial Intelligence (AI) Institute that is being established in partnership with institutions of higher learning, in particular the Johannesburg Business School of the University of Johannesburg and the Tshwane University of Technology which are co-founder institutions together with our Department.
Our focus on digital skills, includes creating platforms to support and promote the ability of our youth, and small and medium enterprises, in particular start-ups to develop digital content. In this regard, South Africa will launch an App Store to be known as DigiTech on the 13th of September 2022. We have undertaken to our sister countries within Africa to ensure that content producers from the rest of the Africa can have their Apps enrolled on the DigiTech App Store.
South Africa acknowledges Data is the currency of the digital economy. We believe in the use of data with trust and there is need for regulation to manage the flow of data. In South Africa, the flow of data is already regulated under the Protection of Personal Information Act, which protects citizens data.
In conclusion, we would like to congratulate India on their incoming Presidency, and we pledge to continue to offer our full cooperation and support. We sincerely appreciated the Presidency of Indonesia
Thank you
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Email: Media@DCDT.gov.za
