Tajikistan Ministry Announces Establishment of Digitization Council to Build High-Tech Park
Farhod Bilolzoda speaks on behalf of the Ministry of Industry and New Technologies of Tajikistan.
At an online platform organized by the Ministry of Industry and New Technologies of Tajikistan, the University of Central Asia, and StrategEast, the Ministry announced its readiness to establish a Digitization Council, with the primary goal of setting up the first High-Tech Park in the country. Experts participating at the event shared their contextual experience of setting up high-tech parks in Eurasia, and its application to Tajikistan.
Speaking at the panel discussion on March 10, Farhod Bilolzoda, Deputy Minister of Industry and New Technologies, elaborated that the Digitization Council will be part of the Ministry, and would promote technological development in various areas, including making broadband more widely accessible in rural areas. He added, “In order to leverage these new opportunities, we need to create a new domain in the Government, private sector, and society in general – a domain that is able and willing to embrace new developments.” The Ministry requested the assistance of the University of Central Asia (UCA), and invited development partners, private sectors and NGOs in developing the composition and strategic objectives of the Digitization Council.
Among the distinguished panelists were Oleksandr Bornyakov, Deputy Minister at Ukraine’s Ministry of Digital Transformation; Konstantin Mikhel, VMP Partners Law Firm, who spoke about IT legislation in Belarus; Dmytro Yeriomin, Member of the Supervisory Board of UNIT, on Ukraine’s experience with IT legislation; and Aytandil Kasradze, Chairman of Georgia’s Innovation and Technology Agency, on public-private partnerships in the creation of high-tech parks. The moderator was Shaukat Ali Khan, Chief Information Officer at the University of Central Asia.
In his remarks, the Rector of UCA, Prof. Dr. S. Sohail H. Naqvi, spoke about the “centrality of people in a knowledge economy, and the need to provide the best educational opportunities and training. Once such a conducive environment is created, there is need for participation by entrepreneurs to expand opportunities through human ingenuity and innovation.” Anatoly Motkin, President of StrategEast, gave examples of the development of the IT sector in Georgia, and its applicability to Tajikistan. Ozodkhon Davlatshoev, Director General of the mobile phone company Tcell, emphasized that since Tajikistan is a mountainous country, its uniform development depends on wide access to high speed internet.
See the full panel discussion at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKp2ZH5Zzxc
