Prime Minister Jean Chrétien today committed Canada to leading the follow-up work to the Digital Opportunity Task Force’s (DOT Force) Genoa Plan of Action. The plan was presented to G8 Leaders at the G8 Summit in Genoa, Italy.

The DOT Force was created following last year’s G8 Summit in Okinawa, Japan, to identify concrete ways to bridge the international digital divide between industrialized and developing countries, and to ensure that developing countries can fully participate in the construction of a truly global Information Society.

"Canada is committed to helping bridge the digital divide, and we have agreed to lead the follow-up work of the DOT Force. This will be a priority for our Presidency of the G8 in 2002," said the Prime Minister. "The DOT Force succeeded because it is a broad, innovative partnership which brings together G8 governments with developing countries and people in the know from the private and not-for-profit sectors, and international organizations."

The report gives G8 Leaders a forward-looking Plan of Action with nine priority areas, including follow-up work in the areas of national Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) strategies, connectivity and access, human capacity development, and, ICT entrepreneurship.

Canada’s representatives on the DOT Force included V. Peter Harder, Deputy Minister of Industry Canada, Charles Sirois, Chairman and CEO of Telesystem Ltd., and Maureen O’Neil, President of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC).

The full text of the DOT Force report, and the Genoa Plan of Action, is available on the following Web site: www.dotforce.org

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