With new team, DICT girds for one digitized government

MANILA, Philippines - The Department of Information and Communication Technology (DICT) has named four new executives to help run the department, comprising the first batch of executives to serve on the inaugural team.

As the law creating the department, Republic Act (RA) No. 10844, officially took effect only on June 9, the Philippines’ newest government agency is still in transition. But if DICT Secretary Rodolfo Salalima would have his way, the newly formed agency shall be known as the “department that never sleeps.”

Salalima sees DICT’s chief mandate as being responsive to the needs of its various stakeholders, perhaps true to the ethos of a 24x7 digital world.

“Our department interfaces with other government agencies because we now live in the Internet era that is driven by technology. We are called upon by our mandate’s responsibilities to be always awake when things are normal and our government is working, and even at times when things are not normal because we are hit by a catastrophe and there are cyber attacks,” he explained.

Salalima’s new team includes former National Telecommunications (NTC) deputy commissioner Jorge Sarmiento, who will serve as DICT’s undersecretary for management and operations; Retired Gen. Eliseo Rio Jr., who will work as undersecretary of special concerns tasked with formulating policies, planning, and programming of cybersecurity and emergency communications; former DOST official Dennis Villorente as undersecretary for development and innovations; and lawyer John Henry Naga as Assistant Secretary.

Under his leadership, Salalima said his team envisions a “one digitized government”with interconnected facilities and whose services are integrated. “We want one digitized government which will bring about one nation,” he said.

Though he did not explain how this would be achieved within the six-year term of the incumbent administration, DICT has a crucial role in President Rodrigo Duterte’s marching orders in his State of the Nation Address to develop a national broadband plan to improve Internet access, provide free WiFi access in public places, and fast processing of requests in all government agencies.

Though still fighting for its own budget next year, at least one of its flagship programs is getting some attention. Under the 2017 proposed budget, the Free Internet Wi-Fi Connectivity in Public Places program would get an increase of P107 million from P1.65 billion this year to P1.76 billion next year.

Senate Minority Leader Ralph Recto said in a recent news release that this would bring to P4.81 billion the total amount allocated for the project since 2015 and the increased funding will be able to provide free broadband access to 1,462 towns and 44 key cities nationwide.

 “We have programs in terms of realizing their (the people’s) basic human right to use the Internet, to have access to telecommunications service, and the right to avail of hardware and equipment. We are also going to introduce a technology in the countryside to empower our people for education, livelihood, and other related matters,” Salalima said.

Playing catch-up

As it is now, the Philippines has a lot of catching up to do with the rest of Asia in ICT development.

The 2016 World Bank Ease of Doing Business report, for example, showed that in the Philippines, it takes a lot longer to start a business (29 days), register property (35 days), pay taxes (193 hours per year), enforce contracts (842 days), or get construction permits (98 days).

Compare this to the fast processing of business permits in Singapore and Hong Kong at only 2.3 and 1.5 days, respectively. Transparency and the use of technology have a lot to do with this.

But things are changing for the better. Early this month, Newsbytes.ph reported that the government is set to implement the nationwide processing of business permits and licensing system (BLPS) before the year ends.

A joint memorandum circular signed by the DICT, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), and the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) also provides for the setting up of a Business One-Stop Shop (BOSS) facility for business registration, and undertaking the computerization and automation of business permit process, among others.

These agencies, along with the NTC and the country’s two leading carriers – Smart and Globe – have also partnered for the nationwide rollout of the nation’s new 911 emergency hotline last August 1.

In a recent meeting with the officers of the IT Journalists Association of the Philippines (Cyberpress), Salalima said the government has to connect and integrate government infostructure and databases and even teach the government workforce on what ICT is to achieve its vision.

He also said that many components of the proposed National Broadband plan are already existing, but it needs direction and integration. “When you talk about the plan, you not only talk about the physical infrastructure, you talk about existing projects, legislation, and policies,” he explained.

Moving up

The Global Connectivity Index released recently by Huawei shows the Philippines as just among the ‘starters’ in ICT adoption, which means that it is in the early stage of ICT infrastructure build-out.

According to the report, countries in the ‘starters’ category like the Philippines have an ICT investment amounting to less than two percent of GDP; 4G coverage at under 10 percent; international bandwidth at less than 100 Kbps, and download speeds don’t reach 10 Mbps. Patents per million capita are fewer than one, and less than one percent of the population works in IT.

The report suggested that for country’s like the Philippines to move to the next stage of ICT growth (the ‘adopter’ stage), it needs to increase ICT investment as a percentage of GDP to accelerate nationwide broadband coverage, reduce tariffs and provide subsidies for smartphones to get more smart devices into homes; issue more telecom licenses to raise coverage and encourage competitive pricing, and start planning for high-speed broadband with 4G and fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) rollout.

All of these are moving in measured steps as the DICT is just starting to build its organizational structure from scratch.

What the department is truly aiming for, according to Salima, is for the ICT industry and the private sector to become the biggest wealth creator and contributor to the country’s GDP, with the DICT as an enabler, innovator and leader in ICT development, especially in the countryside.