Ms. D’Costa will moderate a panel on February 6 from 1:30-3:30 entitled “Quality of Service and Consumer Protection in a Next Generation Networks (NGN) World” that will address such questions as how to ensure consumers the best quality of service at appropriate prices both during and after the transition to NGN and how to sensitize consumers about NGN benefits.

GSR is expected to draw nearly 400 participants from the global ICT regulator community, and Ms. D’Costa well appreciates ITU’s recognition of infoDev’s important role in strengthening that community evident in the Union’s invitation to her:  “I am honored to have been chosen to be a panel moderator at GSR and delighted to be joining with our ITU partners again to engage our regulator colleagues in discussions on strategic, transformative issues in the ICT sector, and to offer them the very best tools and advice we have to address those issues.  I am especially proud to be collaborating with ITU once more so soon after the success of our two-day December training event in Hong Kong on the infoDev-ITU ICT Regulation Toolkit.”

“While in Dubai”, Ms D’Costa continued, “I also intend to talk with the regulators to find out what they think of our products, especially the Toolkit, and to get feedback on the new Toolkit module on Universal Access that will be commissioned shortly and should be completed in January 2008.  Although we will already be covering a wide range of initiatives and best practices in this module, from more traditional universal access approaches to more innovative ones, it is especially timely for me to be seeking advice on key topics and issues that the module should address from regulators at this forum, since effective universal access policies are indispensable as countries make the transition from traditional telephony to NGNs.  I want to be sure that our module is tailored as much as possible to the actual needs of our client countries in the developing world.”

For more information on the ITU’s GSR 2007, click here:  http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/treg/Events/Seminars/GSR/GSR07/index.html