Memo 2: Know the CTO !

Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization (CTO)

Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization (CTO) is one of the fastest evolving international telecommunication organizations in the world today. It basically aims at collaborating efforts of the government and corporate telecommunication departments of commonwealth and non-commonwealth nations, in coordination with their respective business and regulatory institutions, over a multidisciplinary sphere of technology, commerce, policy and socio-economics.

History and Background
“CTO’s presence roots back to 1901, as the Pacific Cable Board”[1]. It was a British undertaking and the work basically involved setup and maintenance of electrical telegraph infrastructure to facilitate limited administrative correspondence. After the independence of several British colonies and the formation of the Commonwealth, “the organization was restructured, in 1967, as an international treaty organization, independent of the Commonwealth Secretariat and with diplomatic status in its host country, the UK”[2]. Since then, it came to be known as the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization (CTO) and underwent several structural, organizational and operational changes and evolved as one of the major international institutions in the telecommunications domain. Thirty five member nations (eg. UK, South Africa, India, Canada, Australia etcetera) formed the governing council of the organization, as these were the key financers of the organization’s existence and eventual growth[3]. Col. D McMilan (UK) and Mr. S.N. Kalra (India) were the first Chairman and Vice-Chairman, respectively, of the structured organization in 1967. Over a period of time, CTO has grown in its role as a telecommunication technology, business and regulatory entity.

Mission[4]
“CTO’s mission is to :
Offer the highest quality programs for capacity development, knowledge sharing and information services to member countries;
Deepen, expand and diversify the partnerships between governments, businesses and other organizations to reduce global poverty and achieve the Millennium Development Goals for ICT;
Help bridge the digital and knowledge divide especially in the five key sectors of food & agriculture (e-nutrition), education (distance learning), health (telemedicine), e-government and e-commerce;
Facilitate the successful development of telecommunications and other businesses to support social and economic development objectives of governments and civil society. “[4]

The Present Structure
The CTO has a very well defined operational as well as organizational framework. The organizational framework basically can be classified under the legislative and the executive tabs. The former forms the Commonwealth Telecommunications Council and the latter, in charge of the organization’s functioning, forms what is known as the CTO Headquarters.

Schematic conceptualization of CTO’s organizational structure based on the information from http://www.cto.int/

Activities
The primary thrust of CTO’s efforts has been towards development of telecommunications technology with the aim of creating a digital parity among the various developing commonwealth nations. ‘Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)’ are the primary focus of CTO today[5]. It collaborates R&D and training programs in technical, business and regulatory capacities at various levels of conception, with several international telecommunication institutions like the ITU, DFID, USAID and TRASA as well as global and local companies such as BT, Cable and Wireless and Telkom South Africa[6]. “Since 1983, it has been aggressively involved in over 3000 bilateral technical projects, 120 international conferences and numerous scholarship schemes, information resources and other activities of value to the governments and telecommunications businesses in Commonwealth countries”[7].
Through its diverse activities, it has, to a great extent, impacted the socio-economic hue of several Afro-Asian societies and hence has contributed a great deal to the rapid development of the global telecommunication machinery.

Credits:
All information, including the logo obtained from http://www.cto.int/
References
[1],[2],[3],[7] http://www.cto.int/index.php?dir=03&sd=50 as on 27th January, 2007
[4] http://www.cto.int/index.php?dir=03&sd=30 as on 27th January, 2007
[5],[6] http://www.cto.int/index.php?dir=08&sd=00 as on 27th January, 2007