Wednesday, March 2nd, 2005

World Bank Vice President and Special Representative for Japan on Global Information Infrastructure

Yukio Yoshimura introduces one of the major ICT initiatives the Bank has been supporting over the last five years

The GIIC meeting, March 2, Washington D.C. (Photo courtesy of Fujitsu)

The Global Information Infrastructure Commission held a conference in Washington D.C. on March 2. The conference was hosted by GIIC co-chairs Naoyuki Akikusa, the chairman of Fujitsu, and Brian Thompson, chairman of Comcast, and attended by executives from GIIC's member companies in their roles as GIIC commissioners.

Mr. Yoshimura delivered a presentation to the conference in which he introduced the Bank's Global Development Learning Network and spoke on the Bank's commitment to the development of information communication technologies world-wide. Expanding on the role of the GDLN, he noted that "any organization, including the private sector, is welcome to use the facility for capacity building, training, policy dialogue, and other purposes designed to provide value and assistance to the poorer countries."

Mr. Yoshimura emphasized the role of disaster mitigation in recent uses of the GDLN, and provided some specific examples drawn from recent activities of the Tokyo Development Learning Center.

In Tokyo, disaster management has become a major priority for our regional GDLN network and Tokyo Development Learning Center. As you know, Japan has a wealth of knowledge about natural disaster mitigation and management, and in particular, experience in coping with earthquakes and tsunami - both warning systems and handling the aftermath.

In my keynote address [to the United Nations World Conference on Disaster Reduction held in Kobe, Japan, in February] I emphasized the role of learning in improved disaster management.

He also cited examples of how the network was used during the recent SARS crisis in Asia and noted that a potential avian flu epidemic now looms over the region and that the network stands ready to serve health and agricultural authorities in the event of another crisis.

The full text of Mr. Yoshimura's speech is available on the World Bank Japan's website.

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JoinTokyo.org: World Conference on Disaster Reduction Begins in Kobe