ISLAMABAD: The closing ceremony of the weeklong 29th South Asian Network Operators Group (SANOG) meeting, jointly organised by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) and the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), was held at the HEC Secretariat on Monday.
Minister of State for Federal Education and Professional Training Muhammad Balighur Rehman was the Chief Guest, while PTA Chairman Dr Syed Ismail Shah, HEC Executive Director Arshad Ali, HEC Operations and Planning Member Ghulam Raza Bhatti and SANOG Programme Committee Chair Philip Smith were also present.
Speaking on the occasion, Balighur Rehman termed the holding of the 29th SANOG meeting in Pakistan a welcoming development and said that the meeting had surely provided a great learning opportunity to the participants. “It is believed that the world has witnessed three industrial revolutions – invention of steam engine, mass scale productions and digital revolution. However, the fourth revolution is taking place now in the form of availability of networking capability,” he said.
The Minister said that the country had made visible progress during the last few years despite economic pressures, terrorism and other challenges. He maintained that the Prime Minister’s Laptop Scheme had played a vital role in ending the digital divide, and the provision of Evo devices to students had increased connectivity.
Admiring the establishment of the Pakistan Education and Research Network (PERN) by the HEC, he said it had immensely improved connectivity among universities. He said the government had remarkably increased the budget of the higher education sector and it was committed to promoting tertiary education.
Appreciating the collaboration between the HEC and the PTA, Dr Ismail Shah revealed that the 29th SANOG meeting addressed all issues relevant to the internet, including connectivity and cyber security. He said the number of internet users as well as data usage had increased in the country. “These facilities need to be used for the service of humanity,” he said.
The event was held jointly with the collaboration of the Internet Society (ISOC), the Asia Pacific Network Information Centre (APNIC) and the Internet Corporation for Assigning Names and Numbers (ICANN). The event consisted of conference presentations, tutorials and hands-on workshop tracks. The first three days consisted of conference and tutorial presentations from diverse local and international community, and focused on current technology updates, trends and challenges related to data networks, while the rest of days’ sessions contained workshops.
The SANOG provides an opportunity to bring together network operators for educational as well as cooperation purposes. It is a regional forum to discuss operational issues and technologies of interest to data operators in the South Asian region. Scope of the SANOG is in line with established practices like NANOG in North America, RIPE meetings in Europe and APRICOT in Asia.
