On January 9th, the Department of Information and Communication Technology signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Cluj IT Cluster of Romania, which sets the stepping stones for cooperation in the area of building the digital economy through establishing a proven cluster model in PNG.
The Memorandum of Understanding signing took place in the presence of Mr. Steven Matainaho, Secretary of the Department of Information and Communication Technology and Cluj IT’s Vice President and coordinator of internationalization activities, Daniel Homorodean, and the official delegation of Papua New Guinea.
The event marks an important step for the collaboration between Papua New Guinea and Romania in the digital transformation and digital economy perspective, Cluj IT being engaged to provide immediate support in strategic areas, such as the development of the Papua New Guinea ICT Incubator, development of the Papua New Guinea clusterization policy and of the PNG ICT Cluster the development of the digital transformation strategies, public policies, standards and good practices and developing of the direct business collaboration between companies from Romania and from Papua New Guinea.
The digital government project under the PNG Cabinet approved Digital Transformation Policy (NEC Decision 252/2020) will position the Government as a client of many ICT solutions providers, preferably local nationals.
The Department of ICT intends to use this major government investment to create an ecosystem in which local ICT SMEs with international partners combine to innovate and provide solutions.
In any State partnership with international providers, it is the duty of the government to provide international exposure for local businesses and grounds for knowledge acquisition.
With this foresight under the leadership of Secretary Matainaho, the MOU intends to pave a direction for the PNG ICT industry in the next 5 and 10 years.
Papua New Guinea aims to become a leading provider of ICT solutions in the South Pacific and through the MOU with Cluj IT Cluster, there is a foreseen acceleration in the start-up of PNG-based firms in partnership with mature clusters such as Cluj in Romania.
Papua New Guinea kindly thanks the Romanian Pavilion Expo 2020 Dubai for hosting this momentous event.