 We are here at the World Telecommunication Development Conference in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates and I am pleased to be joined by Fuwate Purcell who is head of the LSE division of the project and knowledge management department of BDT of the ITU. Fuwate, thank you very much indeed for being with us today. It is a pleasure. I would like to start off by talking about yesterday there was a meeting on the small island developing states and what are the challenges in your opinion currently faced by small island developing states and in particular the Pacific Island states? The issues facing the Pacific Island concerns their vulnerability to climate change. As we know some islands are sinking but to try and help the islands the key issue there is connectivity. Most of the connectivity are in the business district or the main islands but remote islands and rural communities in some countries are not accessing information and communication technologies or ICTs to help them relay their current situation to help them with the social and economic development and also serve as emergency telecommunications during disasters. ITU is involved in a new satellite project perhaps you could tell us a little bit about this project. Yes, that project is really looking at using the low cost satellite terminals so that ITU can provide a dual benefit to these communities so on the other hand it will be served helping them for social and economic development for example on the social side people there everybody not just students will have access to education information so or E education as it is well known E health and on the economic side now if they have or when they have this access they will be able to advertise their produce and whatever they have to the main islands because a lot of those people wouldn't need some produce from the these remote islands and rural communities. Now we have partners we were we're still doing resource mobilization because as you know there is quite a lot of remote islands in this region in this sub region of the Asia Pacific and so we need equipment we need money so that we can train the people there because this is one issue is the lack of capacity on how to operate and also maintain these satellite terminals because it will be a whole new thing so and then on the other side we also need to train the people on how to use the Microsoft applications or any other applications that will be useful for them. We've talked a little bit about the challenges that you're facing regarding project implementation how could this project be replicated in other countries as well do you think? This is a pilot project that we're doing now and the idea is we learn the benefits the issues the challenges and then we can develop a better product so that we are able to replicate it in other islands and also we'll also be looking at resource mobilization because for this project the ITU is providing seed funding of 500,000 Swiss francs so other partners are providing in-kind for example so far we have Intel sat and also Enma sat they're providing free air time for a period to allow the people to use the internet and then they they are also going to provide some in-kind training it's so on the other hand are also providing cash so that we can continue training people in these islands on operating and also management of satellites. And we're here at the World Telecommunication Development Conference in Dubai I wanted to ask you what are your expectations from this conference? My expectation is that member states will continue will approve the continuation of Resolution 30 which asking the Union to pay special attention to least developed countries, small island developing states, landlocked countries and countries and economies in transition and then on the other hand I'm looking for some countries that are able to provide you know some funding for this project and also some private sector that are here I expect some would come up and help ITU achieve this project so that we can learn all the the best practices that comes out of it and then we develop a better product to replicate in other small island developing states in other regions. Thank you very much and if we move today thank you and thank you very much for watching.