NAPLA Meeting announcement

[Karen Rose]

Folks -

Roque Gagliano, who participated at our meeting in Abuja, moderated the 
NAPLA 2007 conference in Venezuela. It took took place on Tuesday during 
the LACNIC X meeting.

A press release was issued about the event and I though the announcement 
might be of interest to you. It discusses many of the issues we raised 
in Abuja.

Best regards,
Karen

===========================


Subject: Proposal Presented for Regional Interconnection in Latin
America and the Caribbean

May 22, 2007 – Isla Margarita – With the attendance of more than 320
participants from 29 countries, the Regional Interconnection Forum
NAPLA 2007 was opened this morning, an event that brings together
representatives of the national interconnection points of the Latin
American and Caribbean region. This important event was broadcast
worldwide using modern webcasting technology that allows individuals
from any region to receive video images and sound in real time and
even to submit questions to the presenters.

The moderator, Roque Gagliano of Antel Uruguay, reminded the audience
that many of the goals established during the previous NAP meeting
have already been accomplished. Traffic exchange points, connectivity
providers and government representatives met to share the sector's
state of the art, as well as to state the urgent need to initiate
applied investigations that will allow interconnecting the different
countries of Latin America and the Caribbean at regional level. He
presented a project for the interconnection of two cities on the
Uruguayan border.

Gabriel Adonaylo of Argentina and Carlos Neira of Colombia
highlighted the cooperation and shared use of good practices in the
application and development of infrastructure. The meeting began with
presentations that reviewed recent activities and future projects of
NAPs of different countries.

After mentioning the development achieved in different regions of his
country, Milton Kaoru Kashiwakura of NAP Brazil agreed with other
presenters on the need to begin investigations on interregional
traffic and actively promoting the production of local content to
generate a critical mass of users that will make this initiative
possible and profitable.

The presentation of Hernan Moreno Escobar of CEPAL covered how the
goals of the eLAC2007 project are being implemented. Mr Moreno also
presented some examples of good practices in national and regional
interconnection. He insisted on the importance of good practices in
relation to generating common projects such as the one that is
connecting national education portals.

In addition, LACNIC's Executive Director stated, as a personal view,
the need to confront difficulties in order to overcome them and to
take advantage of the opportunities the international situation
offers the region. Mr Echeberría pondered the need to continue
working so that technology will be inclusive for everyone. He
explained that to achieve this it is necessary to solve the issue of
relative pricing. Quoting Gabriel Adonaylo, he informed that "For the
same cost as a link between a South American city and the United
States, it would be possible to contract a link having 60 times
greater capacity between New York and London."

When recounting the initiatives that had been presented, Roque
Gagliano, the event's moderator, underlined the fact that several
participants explained the need to promote the production of regional
content and promoting the creation of more interesting content
written in local languages, which In turn would increase local
traffic and thus, he added, more people will want to connect locally.

To conclude, Mr Gagliano emphasized that it is important to take
advantage of international fora such as eLAC-2007 and the IGF to
develop a common vision regarding possible ways of improving
conditions relative to interconnection costs, to sensitize the
different stakeholders, and to develop a regional interconnection
project for Latin America and the Caribbean based on concrete data
obtained through a parallel traffic measurement project.

As in the case of other organizations of the region, the Regional
Interconnection Forum NAPLA 2007 is having its meeting during the
LACNIC X 2007 event, which is being held at Isla Margarita,
Venezuela, from May 21 to May 25, at the Hotel Hesperia, sponsored by
the National Information Technologies Center, CNTI of Venezuela.

press at lacnic.net
Rambla República de México 6125
Montevideo - Uruguay 11400
http://lacnic.net/en/sobre-lacnic/newsletter.html