Caribbean min­is­ters and se­nior ad­vis­ers with re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion signed the Port-of-Spain Com­mit­ment on Dig­i­tal In­te­gra­tion in Trinidad last week.

This agree­ment marked the cul­mi­na­tion of dis­cus­sions that took place dur­ing the ex­ec­u­tive ses­sions on Dig­i­tal Lead­er­ship in the Caribbean on May 15 and 16 and sig­nals a com­mit­ment to col­lec­tive ac­tion in pur­suit of sus­tain­able dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion across the re­gion.

The ex­ec­u­tive lead­er­ship ses­sions were host­ed by the Min­istry of Dig­i­tal Trans­for­ma­tion on be­half of the Gov­ern­ment in part­ner­ship with the In­ter-Amer­i­can De­vel­op­ment Bank (IDB) and the Caribbean Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Union (CTU).

The meet­ing reaf­firmed the pri­or­i­ty to be placed on ad­vanc­ing dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion (DT) to sup­port so­cial and eco­nom­ic growth in the Caribbean.

The ses­sions cre­at­ed an en­abling space in which the re­gion’s most se­nior dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion pol­i­cy­mak­ers with the sup­port of in­ter­na­tion­al­ly-renowned thought lead­ers and speak­ers, dis­cussed and shared in­for­ma­tion on their trans­for­ma­tion ef­forts.

They spoke frankly of their suc­cess­es, chal­lenges and ar­eas of in­ter­ests in seek­ing to lever­age tech­nol­o­gy to im­prove the lives of cit­i­zens at home and abroad; and agreed on ac­tion with­in the rubric of three crit­i­cal dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion ar­eas, name­ly in­fra­struc­tur­al ecosys­tem, cy­ber­se­cu­ri­ty, and dig­i­tal iden­ti­ty (e-ID) and in­ter­op­er­abil­i­ty.

Con­se­quent­ly, and as de­tailed in the Port-of-Spain Com­mit­ment on Dig­i­tal In­te­gra­tion, the agreed ac­tiv­i­ties are to:

• Con­sid­er the cre­ation of a Re­gion­al Gov­ern­ment Cloud lever­ag­ing ex­ist­ing or planned gov­ern­ment da­ta cen­tres across the Caribbean Re­gion.

• Es­tab­lish a re­gion­al da­ta cen­tre to pro­vide a more cost-ef­fec­tive and re­silient so­lu­tion for da­ta stor­age and man­age­ment.

• De­vel­op a Re­gion­al C-SIRT (Com­put­er Se­cu­ri­ty In­ci­dent Re­sponse Team) to co­or­di­nate col­lab­o­ra­tion among na­tion­al CSIRTS.

• En­hance Cy­ber­se­cu­ri­ty Ed­u­ca­tion, Train­ing, and Aware­ness to build ca­pac­i­ty, to ad­dress the skills gap in the cy­ber­se­cu­ri­ty in­dus­try; and to pro­mote safe on­line prac­tices and ed­u­cate cit­i­zens on the risks as­so­ci­at­ed with cy­ber threats.

• De­vel­op a Crit­i­cal In­fra­struc­ture Pro­tec­tion (CIP) Re­gion­al Frame­work to pro­tect crit­i­cal in­fra­struc­ture from cy­ber threats, iden­ti­fy vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties, and im­ple­ment ap­pro­pri­ate risk mit­i­ga­tion mea­sures.

• Pur­sue cross-bor­der recog­ni­tion of dig­i­tal IDs, ad­dress­ing is­sues such as da­ta pro­tec­tion, and pri­va­cy.

• Es­tab­lish a shared repos­i­to­ry of dig­i­tal so­lu­tions (gov­ern­ment-owned source code) al­low­ing gov­ern­ments ac­cess to so­lu­tions re­quired for their dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion ef­forts.

• De­vel­op a re­gion-wide val­i­da­tion of na­tion­al forms of iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and cre­den­tials based on an in­ter­op­er­a­ble dig­i­tal iden­ti­ty.

The 11 coun­tries which formed part of the Com­mit­ment are: T&T, An­tigua and Bar­bu­da, Bar­ba­dos, Be­lize, Cu­ra­cao, Do­mini­ca, Grena­da, Haiti, Suri­name, St Kitts and Nevis; and St Vin­cent and the Grenadines.