 Welcome to the Global Symposium for Regulators 2019 here in Vanuatu we're very pleased to be joining the studio today by Abdi Ahmed who is the general manager for the National Communications Authority for Somalia. Welcome to the studio. Thank you for having me. Great to see you. Now I wanted to start off by talking a little bit about inclusive connectivity which is very much the theme for this year's Global Symposium for Regulators. You're one of the newest regulatory authorities Somalia that's been set up. In your opinion how can one best achieve inclusive connectivity? As you mentioned it's one of the topical issues that we are here in Vanuatu and the global regulatory symposium and connectivity is becoming a really big issue globally. More so in Somalia it's a country that's coming out of a civil conflict and rebuilding its institutions and in that process and in the world the digitized world that we live in today is very it's critical that people are connected to the Internet because the globe is connected so for people to participate in the global economy they have to have that connectivity but connectivity by itself is not enough it has to be inclusive it has to be affordable and people have to have access to it and all those are require a lot of thinking from regulators from policymakers in terms of building infrastructure making infrastructure available and in terms of people having digital skills to access content content itself is a big part of that and also reaching not only a city's and major population centers where operators can make you know financial gain but also extending to rural areas and on remote areas and also also to people who are disadvantages in many ways whether it's disability or or underserved communities so it's huge and you have to look at from different angles and as a regulator we have to think about how we extend that connectivity and make it inclusive and and use the policymakers also to guide us to get connected communities. I was going to ask as a regulator what are the the modern challenges facing you today? Well I mean in our case it's a unique story and most as you know the deregulation and building regulatory authorities across the world has become a common practice but traditionally the way it started was government owned networks, government owned infrastructure and they privatized those networks to take advantage of competition and the private sector. In our case the industry grew before the government was capable of regulating so you have a powerful operators that are in in our in our country who have not been regulated in the past so you can imagine how difficult it is to come in into a marketplace where people are not used to regulations and ask them to do things that it took for granted for doing for a long time by themselves so it's so we are trying to build so one of the ways we're trying to really get leverage within the regulatory sphere is to get the to build confidence and to build relationships with the operators and make them understand that you know light touch regulation is the best interest for them it brings order to the marketplace it ensures and gives them assurances to their investments in the industry so they can invest and have the assurance that you know they will be treated well and the regulatory aspects of it will be covered so instead of being afraid of regulator we want them to work with the regulator so it's to build the networks to get access to people so it's win-win situation where when you build the networks and you get access to people companies make money people get access and we make sure in areas where the operators may not make money necessarily to incentivize through maybe universal fund and things like that and use innovative technologies and encourage them to use innovative technologies to have the reach and inclusivity that we need how is ITU helping you on your journey or ITU has been critical to our growth and establishment the ITU is particularly the development bureau has been very instrumental in in getting us the assistance we need we recently have a working relationship and we have an agreement with the ITU we have a frameworks agreement with ITU where they have been helping us with the policy development as well as now we're working on different projects within with the DEET sector to build our capacity and and then bring knowledge to our people but also to build some of these policy areas and policy frameworks and regulatory frameworks so we're getting a lot of assistance from them and we really appreciate that and and we will continue to work with them and also with other regulators in our region but also globally you've come across the world essentially to be to be here for this event it is wanted to find out what do you hope will be some of the key takeaways that you'll be able to take back with you well as the one of the new US regulators is a very important for us to not reinvent the wheel so because regulators have been around they've been meeting and have conferences for for many many years now 20 years and for us it's learning opportunity learning you know to learn from the experiences developed as practices so we can have some things that we can take away back home and apply and also it's a great forum for exchange of ideas and how people are dealing with issues of connectivity issues of inclusivity and things like that so we view it as a great venue and a great summit for us to be to be around to learn from our counterparts. Finally inclusive connectivity is it do you think the future of regulation? Oh absolutely I mean you to really get the connectivity and make it inclusive you need not only the policies and the policy frameworks that go live but also the regulatory interventions so regulators have responsibility to where the private sector and the private sector is not efficient enough to come in and help and incentivize private sector to provide that inclusive connectivity. Well that's wonderful thank you very much indeed for for sharing a few insights into your side of the world and into your perspective and we hopefully will catch up with you again at the next GSR. Thank you very much and thank you for the opportunity and I hope fully in the future we will have sessions like this and I hope others will learn from our experience as well. Yeah thank you very much indeed.