Leaders of the National ICT Confederation of the Philippines, a 35-strong organization composed of ICT councils of Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao gathered last Wednesday in Legazpi City for a general assembly to rally its ICT-BPO stakeholders to support three primary initiatives. Jocelle Batapa-Sigue, NICP’s chairperson and one of the most v isible champions of the DICT bill, shares that the initiative has just passed its third and final approval in the Senate.
“Moving forward, we are formally submitting our notations for the bicameral meeting and expect that a final draft be finished in a few weeks for submission to the Office of the President”. The creation of the Department of ICT is seen by our stakeholders as a way forward in the transformation of our country to ultimately become a knowledge-based economy.
NICP officers also commend the efforts of the Information and Communications Technology Office (ICTO) under the Department of Science and Technology for its unwavering support for the next wave cities initiative, a program that will spur the aggressive development of regional hubs and scale up Philippine ICT competitiveness.
The ongoing TWSP (Training for Work Scholarship Program) of NICP in cooperation with the Technical Education and Skills Development (TESDA) and the Business Processing Association of the Philippines (BPAP), which was also discussed in the assembly, is a testament to the effective public-private collaboration that hopes to see the creation and deployment of hundreds of thousands of jobs in non-NCR regional hubs.
The March 8, 2012 1st quarter NICP general assembly of key leaders also tackled a unique program with the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) called the “e-Gov Awards” which seeks to benchmark and promote the exchange of best practices in IT-driven processes among local governments. It primarily seeks to recognize the measurable effect of an a local government unit’s practices in applying ICT solutions in the education and engagement of the public in the use of electronic facilities and channels towards providing improved, timely and relevant delivery of public services, as well as in integrating ICT solutions and the commitment of its administration in the bureau’s responsiveness to the needs of business enterprises, thereby creating business opportunities.
The first assembly for the year was hosted by Albay ICT Association, Inc. – Legazpi City ICT Council (AICTA-LCICTC) and attended by Bacolod-Negros Occidental Federation for ICT (BNEFIT), Inc., Balanga ICT Council, Cagayan de Oro ICT Council (CDO ICT), Cavite ICT Council, ICT Davao, Inc., ICT Association of Dumaguete and Negros Oriental, ICT@Bicol Council, ICT Davao, Inc., Iloilo Federation for IT (IFIT), Laguna Industry Network for Knowledge, Innovation & Technology Foundation (LINK-IT), Quezon City ICT Council – QC ICT Global Services Outsourcing Task Force, and Vigan ICT Council. Also represented was the convenors of ICT councils for the province of Batangas and Leyte.