R 132018Z APR 09
FM SECSTATE WASHDC
TO ALL OECD CAPITALS COLLECTIVE
USEU BRUSSELS
USDOC WASHINGTON DC 0000

UNCLAS STATE 036296 
 
 
OECD 
OECD FOR J. MALLORY 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ECPS EIND ECON OECD
SUBJECT: ORGANISATION FOR ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION AND 
DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE FOR INFORMATION, COMPUTER AND 
COMMUNICATIONS POLICY, PARIS, FRANCE, MARCH 11-13, 2009. 
 
¶1.  Summary:  The 57th session of the OECD Committee for 
Information, Computer and Communications Policy (ICCP) was 
held on March 11-13, 2009, at OECD Headquarters in Paris, 
France.  Richard C. Beaird, Acting U.S. Coordinator for 
International Communication and Information Policy, served as 
Head of Delegation.  The delegation consisted of 
representatives from EEB/CIP/MA, EEB/IPE, FCC, DOC (NTIA and 
USPTO), Mission Paris, and the private sector.  The meeting 
focused on the review of accession countries, OECD members, 
recovery plans as well as OECD research on the global 
financial crisis and economic recovery, the OECD innovation 
strategy, OECD work on information and communication 
technology (ICT) and the environment, and the 
declassification of documents.   The ICCP also jointly hosted 
a workshop with the United Kingdom on Innovation and Policy 
for Virtual Worlds.  Scoping activities for new work also 
commenced on the topics of cloud computing and the activities 
of Internet intermediaries (yet to be defined).  Specific 
agenda items are reviewed below.  ICCP,s next meeting will 
be held in Paris, October 14-16, 2009, and will include a 
Technology Foresight Forum on Cloud Computing.  End Summary. 
 
¶2.  Review of Accession Countries: 
 
Israel and Chile made presentations on steps they are taking 
to accept ICCP-related instruments and to adjust their 
policies to make them more consistent with OECD instruments. 
Chile did not cover intellectual property rights in their 
presentation; the Israelis, in contrast, included an 
extensive section on copyright-related issues in their 
presentation.  The ICCP found that both countries are willing 
and able to assume obligations of membership in the fields of 
information security and privacy. 
 
¶3.  Framework for the participation of non-governmental 
stakeholders: 
 
Following on the recommendations of OECD Ministers at the 
June 2008 Seoul Ministerial on the Future of the Internet 
Economy, the ICCP agreed to a framework for the participation 
of non-governmental stakeholders from civil society, the 
Internet technical community, namely the Civil Society 
Information Society Advisory Committee (CSISAC) and the 
Internet Technical Advisory Committee (ITAC).  These 
stakeholders will be able to participate in meetings of the 
committee, and have access to official documents.  The 
Committee may restrict participation in a particular meeting 
to member government delegations (with or without observers). 
It may also do so for a particular item on its agenda. These 
restrictions should be communicated in advance, where 
possible.  These conditions were contained in the main text 
of the paper, including Annex A, which the committee 
declassified. 
 
¶4.  OECD Review of ICCP,s Work: 
 
The ICCP is undergoing a periodic review of its performance, 
relevance and effectiveness as part of the OECD structures. 
A review panel, consisting of several OECD ambassadors and 
led by the Ambassador Lopez, the Spanish ambassador to the 
OECD, will produce terms of reference for the review.  The 
review will look at the ICCP work from 2004-2009.  The review 
panel expects to produce a report to Council by October 2009. 
 
¶5. United Kingdom-ICCP Workshop on Innovation and Policy for 
Virtual Worlds: 
 
The workshop focused on emerging issues surrounding virtual 
worlds.  According to statistics cited at the workshop, 120 
million people participate in virtual worlds globally.  The 
panellists discussed whether it is the purview of governments 
to decide whether or not to regulate virtual worlds, and if 
so, to what extent.  The panellists expressed that as virtual 
worlds grow, governments will be faced with public policy 
issues such as protecting users from cybercrime and privacy 
risks.   In ICCP plenary, spirited debate characterized the 
choice of topic for the ICCP,s focus at the next ICCP 
meeting; the committee will hold a 8Technology Forsight 
Forum8 on cloud computing, although several members 
preferred the topic Internet intermediaries.  These workshops 
and fora are key to the ICCP agenda and work program 
formulation in the two-year ICCP work cycles. 
 
¶6. Discussion on the Economic Crisis: 
 
The OECD research on the economic crisis focuses primarily on 
forward-looking, government-based actions.  The U.S. thanked 
the OECD for their excellent macro-level analysis of the 
economic crisis, but stated that macro and micro-level 
analysis must be correlated.  The U.S. also emphasized that 
in addition to an examination of government roles, the OECD 
must understand how governments should relate to corporations 
to spur economic recovery.  Corporations will react to 
economic recovery, but they will also be an essential force 
in the recovery as well. 
 
The delegate from the United Kingdom added that the 
presentation should have emphasized the fundamental role of 
broadband in innovation, and the role of governments in 
giving incentives to use broadband.  The Business and 
Industry Advisory Committee to the OECD (BIAC) added that it 
is important to focus on retooling educational skill sets to 
spur innovation.  This point was reiterated during a 
presentation by Gordon Graylish of Intel, who indicated that 
the role of government during the economic crisis could be to 
focus on 21st century skills, to encourage research and 
development; to foster a legislative environment friendly to 
business; and to invest in education.   The ICCP will 
continue to review OECD documents, including cross-committee 
documents, on the role of ICTs in general economic recovery, 
throughout 2009, especially in the lead-up to the OECD 
Council and Ministers meetings.  The U.S. will develop more 
in-depth policy positions as to the role of ICTs in economic 
recovery as we begin implementation of the American Recovery 
and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) provisions (e.g., broadband 
mapping and infrastructure investment). 
 
¶7. The Innovation Strategy Project: Interim Report: 
 
Member states and BIAC provided comments on the paper.  Most 
agreed that the latest version of the draft interim report is 
greatly improved from previous iterations.  During the floor 
discussion of the innovation strategy Andy Wyckoff, the 
member of the Secretariat presently coordinating ICCP work, 
highlighted the importance of IPR to innovation and to "open 
innovation" in particular. The U.S. thanked the Secretariat 
for their work, including the new emphasis on necessary legal 
frameworks for innovation.  The U.S. indicated that the 
report could benefit from more discussion on how governments 
can encourage investment and the role of the private sector 
in meeting the challenges of the economic crisis. 
The innovation strategy will go to Council by mid-May.  The 
Secretariat requested comments on the draft innovation 
strategy report by March 31, 2009.  The final version of the 
report will be presented to the Ministerial Council Meeting 
in 2010.  This work on the innovation strategy will feed into 
other papers for the Ministerial meeting, including the 
report on the OECD,s strategic response to the economic 
crisis. 
 
¶8.  Forging Partnerships for Advancing the Internet Economy 
(aka Internet Intermediaries): 
 
The OECD Secretariat has proposed initial work in a new field 
through a research outline, on a topic that may raise issues 
involved in the global Internet Governance debate.  Several 
members outlined their strong interest in the general topic 
(note also Technology Foresight Forum debate), but advocated 
for the need to better define the actors and terms that the 
OECD seeks to encompass in this future analysis.  The U.S. 
thanked the Secretariat for this outline and emphasized that 
the issue of intermediaries between telecommunications 
operators and customers is important.  The U.S. stated that 
the list of intermediaries presented in Table 1 of the 
document is very broad and inclusive- it ranges from Internet 
service providers (ISPs) to virtual worlds.  The U.S. also 
conveyed concern that if we rush into regulatory conclusions 
on these intermediaries it will lead to difficulties, and we 
will have a hard time agreeing on lessons learned.  The first 
need is to understand the important role of intermediaries, 
such as ISPs, in economic recovery.  The second priority may 
be to examine existing mechanisms for cooperation and 
governance.  The third priority may be to examine the legal, 
policy, and regulatory norms associated with intermediaries 
and looking at how these relate to public policy goals. 
Other members supported the U.S. call to limit the work in 
early phases to a definitional and stock-taking exercise, 
short of policy conclusions.  Separately the U.S. learned 
that the ITAC had worked with the Secretariat to improve the 
initial draft as to its factual basis and methodology. 
 
¶9. ICTs and the Environment: 
 
The U.S. intervened to state that it would be helpful for the 
OECD to look at the ITU for possible collaboration on this 
issue.  Denmark also spoke on this issue- highlighting their 
upcoming conference on ICT and the environment in May. 
Denmark also indicated that they will host the United Nations 
Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December, 2009. 
The Danish government expects 19,000 participants at the UN 
conference. 
 
¶10. Declassfication: 
The committee agreed to declassify several documents by 
written procedure. 
CISP 
i) Broadband Over Power Lines: Developments and Policy Issues 
ii) Network Externality Premiums and International Traffic 
Exchange 
iii) ENUM: Converging Telephone Numbers and Addresses in Next 
Generation Networks 
iv) Developments in Voice Service Markets 
v) Mobile Broadband: Pricing and Services 
WPIE 
vi) Policies and Programmes on ICT and the Environment: A 
Survey on Initiatives of Governments and Industry 
Associations 
vii)Measuring the Relationship between ICT and the 
Environment 
viii) The Information and Communication Technology Sector in 
India: Performance, Growth and Key Challenges 
 
 
CLINTON