Environmental sustainability and progress towards the ministerial meeting highlight the week of the BRICS ICT Working Group
Information and Communication Technology work this week (April 2-3) focused on preparing the “Green Digital Action” seminar and adjusting the priority pillars towards the declaration that member countries’ Communications ministers will sign in June.
With information from Brasil’s Ministry of Communications
After a successful first meeting in March, with promising discussions about the development of a meaningful connectivity map in the BRICS countries, the bloc’s Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Working Group (WG) met again on April 2-3, this time focused on the environmental sustainability pillar and arrangements towards the ministerial declaration, which will be presented in early June when the BRICS Communication Ministers meeting is scheduled to occur.
Green Digital Action
Held online on Wednesday (2), the seminar strengthened the BRICS commitment to sustainability, highlighting ways the ICTs can become allies in building a greener future. The event allowed for the exchange of experience exchanges among countries, bolstering new strategies to address environmental challenges without compromising economic growth and digital inclusion.
Juliano Stanzani, director at the Department of Sectoral Policies of the Brazilian Ministry of Communications (MCom), classified the event as one of the WG’s main deliveries this year. “The Information and Communication Technology sector is a supplier of goods and services that permeate all human activities, encompassing both economic aspects and social aspirations. The innovative initiatives brought by the ICTs are essential to boosting solutions that contribute to the continuous search for respect for the ecosystem and for social and economic development," highlighted the director at the opening of the seminar.
Among the themes addressed by the member countries were emergency telecommunication services, energy efficiency, and circular economy. One of the Brazilian initiatives presented during the seminar was the Cell Broadcast emergency system, known as Defesa Civil Alerta. The implementation of the Federal Government’s emergency alert tool was coordinated by the National Civil Defense (Defesa Civil Nacional) and the National Telecommunications Agency (Agência Nacional de Telecomunicações/ANATEL) and is executed by mobile network operators. This ensures that every person in an area of natural disasters, including flooding, flash floods, inundations, landslides, and gale-force winds, receives the alerts without the need to previously register for the service.
India and Egypt also stressed the importance of using Information and Communication Technologies to early warning systems for natural disasters and risk mitigation in the emergency telecommunications sector. "To support this transition, financial and operational incentives are being offered to digital operators, telecommunications concessionaires, and wind energy companies. These regulations aim to establish a sustainable and low-carbon digital infrastructure in the country," informed the Egyptian representative, Yasmina Ali.
Progress towards the ministerial meeting
On Thursday (3), Brasil led the WG’s second technical meeting, held online. The meeting agenda centered on the beginning of negotiations regarding the ministerial declaration, which the ministers of the country members will sign on June 2 in Brasilia during a face-to-face meeting.
Jeferson Nacif, head of MCom’s International Advisory Office; Marcelo Martinez, head of the Digital Issues Division at Brasil’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Alexandre Moraes, international advisor at ANATEL; and William Zambelli, MCom’s general coordinator for Public Policies and Telecommunication Services, held a press conference at the BRICS headquarters.
Marcelo Martinez presented a summary of the discussions. “The initial goal of the meeting was to verify the progress of the work in each priority pillar and to present the first draft of the ministerial declaration. We also made a brief assessment to define the next steps according to our WG calendar,” he informed. The ICT WG’s next technical meeting is scheduled for May 6.
The Brazilian delegation is composed of technical staff from the Ministries of Communications and Foreign Affairs, the National Telecommunications Agency (ANATEL), and partner organizations such as the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and Brasil’s Regional Center for Studies on the Development of the Information Society (Centro Regional de Estudos para o Desenvolvimento da Sociedade da Informação/Cetic.br).