Sri Lanka’s ICT agenda will be key in its growth story: Huawei Lanka

‘ICT needs to be integrated with every sector of the economy to be competitive globally’

by Sanath Nanayakkare

Sri Lanka’s ICT agenda will form a significant part of its growth story in the years to come, Indika De Zoysa, Vice President, Huawei Technologies Lanka told The Island yesterday.

“It is therefore imperative that ICT be integrated with every sector of the economy of Sri Lanka for the country to be competitive globally”, he said.

“Building a thriving ICT ecosystem across the country will help boost development in the far-flung villages. However, one of the priorities in doing so, is to make connectivity affordable and remove coverage barriers through innovations in connectivity, AI, cloud, and mobile devices,” he said.

“Tech for All is Huawei‘s long-term digital inclusion initiative across the world including Sri Lanka and we are committed to bringing digital to every person, home and organisation for a fully connected, intelligent world boosting the economic growth of the country as well as the standards of education, health, environment and development,” he said.

“Applications are key to create digital ecosystems and help developers build applications for different requirements of communities and industries. With the use of right skilled ICT personnel and platforms, Sri Lanka can ensure fair treatment to everyone in providing quality education throughout the country”.

“ICT has a key role to play in our effort to mitigate the effects of climate change and enable nature conservation. Sri Lanka can take the cue from China as to how they monitor the activity and the living environment of the tiger and leopard in real time for biodiversity protection, and use that experience to help mitigate the human-elephant conflict in Sri Lanka”.

Digitally Inclusive Sri Lanka will facilitate the country’s vision to drive innovation, IT Entrepreneurship and citizen centric digital government. 2021-2030 is introduced as the Decade of Skills Development, and so, we should strive to position Sri Lanka as the epicentre of human resource development in Asia”.

“We must connect rural areas to the digital world using cost-effective ICT solutions to boost their agriculture and development in productive and sustainable ways. Huawei Lanka will support Sri Lanka in every step of the way to boosting its digital economy and living standards”, Indika De Zoysa said.