30 October 2009
Tunis — Tunisia recently hosted a conference of the "IT Managers Forum" organized by IDC Middle East, Africa and Turkey ("International Development Consultants"), the premier global market intelligence and advisory firm in the information technology and telecommunications industries, gathering businessmen and technology experts from across the region that will present the best practices on how to become a smart IT buyer in crisis situations. It is the first time Tunisia hosts such an event.
The conference highlighted the most appropriate solutions for managers of information systems (ISD), interested in how Information Technology (IT) can be used to activate and transform patterns and the commercial processes.
The opening session of the "IT Managers Forum" was attended by Mrs. Lamia Chaffai Sghaier, Secretary in charge of Informatics, Internet and free software, with the presence of Mr. Ilias Hamdouch, CEO of IDC North Africa and representatives of public institutions in the ICT sector.
Mrs. Sghaeir highlighted the growing role of the ICT sector in improving productivity adding that the ICT is a strategic sector contributing to 10% of the national GDP and that it will achieve 13.5% in 2011.
With the increase threefold of the capacity of the internet bandwidth connection to reach 17.5 Gbit / s, the number of Internet users continues to grow in Tunisia, reaching 3.22 million in late August 2009 with the aim to reach 3.5 million by the end of 2009, she added.
The number of ADSL subscribers, has reached, 302,100 by the end of August 2009 with an increase of over 80%, she said.
Mrs. Sghaier said that as part of national program to make computers and the Internet available for every citizen, 50 regions have been connected to the Internet. She also said that there are currently some 1 million 200,000 computers currently in use in the country.
Insofar as the technological boom in Tunisia is concerned, the Secretary of State said that the World Economic Forum ICT Report of 2008-2009 has ranked Tunisia 1st in the Maghreb and Africa, and the 38th among 134 countries worldwide.
Regarding "offshoring" Tunisia is 17th in the world, she noted.
In an interview with TUNISIAONLINENEWS, IDC's CEO for North Africa, Mr. Hamdouch said that "IDC has plans afoot to set up software development projects in Tunisia, with Morocco, Algeria , Egypt, Libya, Nigeria and South Africa, in the pipeline."
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