ICC Secretary General is candidate in internet election
Paris, 30 August, 2000 - ICC Secretary General, Maria Livanos Cattaui has been nominated for election to the Executive Board of ICANN (www.icann.org) - the international body responsible for the smooth running of the internet.
Mrs Cattaui is one of the candidates selected to contest the European seat on the ICANN Board. She was selected by the ICANN Nominating Committee.
ICANN - the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers - is the non-profit organization responsible for the technical management of the internet and the formation of global net policy.
Rather than being a regulator of the net, ICANN is a co-ordinating tool that deals with the regulation of domain names and the allocation of internet provider address space.
The election will be held online for ten days from 1 October. A candidate from each of five geographic regions - Africa, Europe, Asia/Pacific, Latin America and North America - will be elected to the Executive Board.
Drawing on her extensive experience working with companies at the vanguard of internet technology, Mrs Cattaui says she hopes to extend the benefits of the emerging net economy to as many people as possible.
"The internet is a resource that connects individuals and entrepreneurs from all corners of the globe to the same vast reservoir of information and connectivity," she says. "As this resource has grown, and the demands on it have soared exponentially, so too has the need to properly ensure equality of access to all internet users."
As the chief executive of the world business organization, Mrs Cattaui notes that she has witnessed first hand the power of the internet as a creator of new markets and catalyst for innovation.
"It encourages entrepreneurial spirit, drives the establishment of new markets and enables individuals to challenge the established order," she said. "We have to accept that in the new world of e-commerce and increasing global connectivity, old rules and traditional methods of doing business may no longer be sufficient."
Her candidacy is underpinned by a desire to see the benefits of the internet extended to the countries that need them most.
Referring to the so-called "digital divide" between the world's developed and least developed countries, Mrs Cattaui stressed the importance of building infrastructures that allow people from all nations to participate in the internet revolution.
"The internet is in my opinion one of the great hopes for extending to people in least developed nations the same opportunities in the emerging global economy as their counterparts in more developed economies," she says. "As was recently discussed at a high-level meeting between the United Nations and the world business community - and as was further borne out by the recent G8 Summit in Okinawa - bridging the so-called digital divide has become one of the world community's most pressing concerns.
"From business people wanting to exploit more effectively their presence on the net to governments of developing countries keen to ensure their constituency is not left behind in the cyberworld, all rely on effective, and efficient management of the internet."
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