27 Mar 2023
1 Thank you very much, co-facilitators. Singapore is delighted to join this thematic deep dive and looks forward to the various other dialogues that you will be organising as well. I also want to thank both of you for your leadership in structuring the discussions today around the topic of digital inclusion and connectivity and thank you also for your guiding questions.
2 Last week, the UN had a very significant conference on water, and we learned that 2 billion people lack access to running water. Today we have heard from the Secretary General of ITU, an advocate on this issue, that 2.7 billion people lack access to the internet or any kind of digital services. Given this, the issue that we are discussing in this room today is absolutely important. It is something that I think we as a diplomatic community in New York have not given the attention that it needs. I hope that this discussion on the Global Digital Compact that you have launched, co-facilitators, will attract the serious attention this issue deserves. For Singapore, we look at the Global Digital Compact as an accelerator for the implementation of the SDGs; an accelerator for inclusivity, including all segments of society, and also as an accelerator for partnerships between governments and between governments and civil society and stakeholders, whether it is the private sector or other civil society representatives. I want to acknowledge their participation in this deep dive. I know many are joining the discussions virtually. Thank you very much for your engagement.
3 Now, let me address some of the issues with regard to digital inclusion and connectivity. We think that the starting point for the Global Digital Compact should be digital inclusion and connectivity. That would be a good way to build consensus around the Global Digital Compact. In this regard, I want to make a few points.
4 First, the Global Digital Compact must make a commitment to provide universal access and connectivity to the internet by 2030. The Secretary-General of the ITU earlier spoke about the estimated cost of doing so – about US$400 billion. But if we do not address this issue now the cost will continue to escalate. It is also important that we do not look at this issue as a question of aid and assistance. This is not about aid and assistance. This is about investment and partnership, investing in our people and investing in our societies. It is on the basis of investment that we must build those partnerships. So it is not a question of going around asking for aid and assistance. Nonetheless, developing countries do need help in terms of building the partnerships and making the necessary investments. Now, there are certainly a lot of models for partnership with the private sector and other actors. But beyond the financial aspects, we should also look at the non-financial barriers to universal and affordable access. In ASEAN, at the regional level, we have a digital master plan known as the ASEAN Digital Master Plan 2025. Based on the experience we have had in ASEAN, many respondents to a survey conducted by the ASEAN Secretariat indicated that the real barriers to the deployment of digital infrastructure in ASEAN are not financial. This means that while money is available for a good investment, the real barriers are often non-financial in terms of building the infrastructure, in terms of getting planning permissions, and in terms of carrying out the various infrastructure projects and feasibility studies. We should not underestimate the non-financial barriers in this regard and I think that Singapore and ASEAN can share experiences in this area.
5 The second point that I want to make is that connectivity is also a question of affordability. Many previous speakers have raised this too. Affordability relates to infrastructure, but it also relates to government policy. Fundamentally national authorities and governments have to be conscious about how they can ensure affordability and here we need to be open to a variety of approaches. In some cases, this will require a telecommunications sector that is fully liberalised as is the case in Singapore. We have a very competitive telecommunications sector for mobile operators. I think it is important to achieve that level of competition and private sector participation in order to achieve high standards for the consumer. For example, in Singapore, the average person pays less than US$0.50 per gigabyte for mobile internet, while enjoying one of the fastest internet services in the world. Nonetheless, there is no one size fits all approach and every country needs to find its own path. This is where we need to recognise that different countries will have different approaches and not try and adopt a cookie cutter approach. In this regard, the Global Digital Compact can provide a platform for exchange of best practices. I think that will be the value of the Global Digital Compact.
6 My third point is about inclusivity. Inclusivity is of course about including different segments of society and the population, but the key to inclusivity at the global level is interoperability. In other words, if we all have 193 different national systems that operated according to its own sets of standards and regulations, we will not be globally inclusive because the different national systems will not be able to communicate and connect with each other. If we want to be truly inclusive at the global level, we must work on interoperability. This is where I think the Global Digital Compact can put forward elements or ideas on how we can make our systems interoperable so that the different systems can communicate with each other, so that data can flow between systems, and so that there can be digital services provided between countries. I want to cite one example. This year in February, Singapore and India launched a linkage between our respective national payments systems (PayNow in Singapore and UPI in India) that will allow anyone in India plus anyone in Singapore to make payments to each other with a tap of their phone and with a click of a button. I think this really allows people in both countries to access services in each other's countries in a remarkable way. That, I think, is very exciting for our two countries, and we hope as Singapore that we will be able to have such partnerships with as many countries as possible.
7 The fourth point I want to make with regard to inclusivity and connectivity is digital literacy and skills. In Singapore, we promote digital skills for daily living and digital skills for employability, businesses, and education. These cater to citizens of all ages: through our National Digital Literacy programme for our children, Skills Framework for Infocomm Technology for our workforce, Seniors Go Digital programme for our elderly. More fundamentally, however, it is necessary to recognize that our citizens need to first have access to inclusively designed digital services that take their needs into account, through the use of which they can go on to build their digital literacy, competencies and skills. In this regard, it is important to think in terms of global best practices for the inclusive provision of government digital services. The Global Digital Compact can help to provide guidelines or best practice standards that governments can adopt voluntarily in order to enhance their own service delivery in a way to maximises inclusivity. In Singapore, all government e-services are required to follow a set of Digital Service Standards to ensure that digital services are accessible and user-friendly to meet the needs of diverse user groups, including the elderly and the less-abled. Our Digital Service Standards are also guided by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, an internationally adopted standard for digital accessibility. We can consider similar efforts at the international level as part of the GDC. Together, we can commit to ensuring that government e-services lead the way in inclusivity, and in this way we can set a benchmark and an example for others in the digital ecosystem to follow.
8 These are some of our initial ideas. This is an exciting and important topic and Singapore will continue to participate actively in these discussions. Thank you.
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