Accra, 17, Jan. GNA - The Government has been urged to enact laws to regulate the use of Information Communication Technology (ICT) to enable the country to derive maximum benefits from ICT application. Dr George Essegbey, Director of Science and Technology Policy Research Institute (STEPRI) of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), who made the call, attributed the serious challenges facing the country and Africa to the inability to formulate appropriate policies to maximize the output of applying ICT in development. Dr Essegbey was speaking at a day's stakeholders meeting to discuss 93Ghana's ICT Sector Performance Review Report. He noted that new technologies were having tremendous impact on the economy and there was the need for vibrant policies and a regulatory body to oversee the activities of the ICT Sector.

He said this would help in attaining maximum benefits of applying technology as a tool for economic development, adding that STEPRI was mandated to provide research inputs for national policy initiations and that the telecommunication research was a core research programme to review the performance of telecommunication and information communication technologies in the country.

Presenting the Report on Ghana's ICT Sector performance, Dr Godfred Frempong, Head of Industry and Service Division STEPRI, also stressed the urgent need for one regulatory body to oversee the activities of ICT, Media and Telecommunication as the three were interrelated. He, therefore, appealed to the Government to expedite action on the passage of bills relating to the ICT Sector.

Dr Frempong said although there had been a reduction in call charges since 2003, yet more could be done, especially with the on-net call charges, since the operators reaped more profit. He said it was the Government's policy to have telecommunication services throughout the country by the year 2010 or before, using the Community Information Centres (CIC).

The Government intends to establish 230 CIC in all constituencies between 2005 and 2008 to expand universal service penetration to at least 25 per cent of the population, which should include at least 10 per cent penetration in rural areas.

He said the Government would finance the programme from the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Funds and would be managed by the district assemblies with the Government providing technical assistance. The Report said 14 out of 17 Ministries representing 82.4 per cent were connected to broadband while 17.6 per cent have dial-up Internet connection with the ratio of networked computer to staff at 1:2. He said 77.1 per cent of computers were networked and the Government spent 3.1 million cedis in training a staff in ICT. Dr Frempong explained that 83 per cent of urban areas had access to fixed telephone lines while rural areas had 17 per cent in 2005. The Report stated that fixed line grew by 9.4 per cent between 2000 and 2005 and mobile phones grew by 87.4 per cent between 2000 and 2005 with high patronage by urban dwellers.

It said survey in 2004-showed only 0.4 per cent subscriptions in rural areas but it could be effectively improved by the utilization of signal by communities along highways where signal was present. 17 Jan. 07