TUNIS - Tunisia was ranked 1st in Africa and the Maghreb and 39th internationally by the 9th Global Information Technology Report (GITR) for 2009-2010. The latter is made by the Davos Global Economic Forum and the European Business Administration Institute (INSEAD).
The Report, published this year on "Information and Communication Technology in the Service of Sustainability" and whose findings were released recently in New York, is one of the most exhaustive and viable assessments on the international scale regarding the impact of ICT on countries' development process and their competitiveness.
It assesses the countries' capacity to command communication technologies according to three criteria: political and economic environment appropriate for the development of new technologies, the level of use of information and communication technologies and the level of technological progress.
The Report also ranked Tunisia 6th on the international scale in matters of ICT promotion in different regions of the country and setting up of a legal framework designed to support the private sector and boost the national economy.
In addition, it retained the Tunisian experience in the area of ICT as an example to bfollow, all the more so that Tunisia was one of the first African countries to set up a national strategy based on information and communication technologies.
The major targets of this strategy are the modernisation of infrastructure in different regions of the country, setting up a legal framework of e-economy to consolidate the private sector and improving the national economy's competitiveness.
By late 2009, there were 1,284,924 computers in Tunisia and 3,520,000 Internet users, i.e. 35 users per 100 inhabitants. The rate of the country's connection to the international Internet network is estimated at 27.5 gigabits/second while the number of mobile telephone users is over 9.82 million.
As a result of the gains made and given the country's environment favourable to investment, several multinational companies have chosen Tunisia and offshored their activities dedicated to international markets (call centres, outsourcing, applications and software industry).
Tunisia seeks to achieve a qualitative leap in the area of ICT by achieving the objectives of the presidential programme "Together We Meet Challenges." The point is to reach one million new broadband Internet users and ease digital access for Tunisian families.
Efforts are also exerted to develop digital contents, set up the terrestrial digital television and involve civil society in the building up of the information society.
© Agence Tunis Afrique Presse 2010
