 Welcome to the ITU studio here in Budapest, Hungary, where we're here at the ITU Telecom World 2019. I'm very pleased to be joining the studio today with Mr Nyongbi Tembo, who is the director of the Rural Communications Development Fund in Uganda. Welcome to the studio. Thank you. Now, I'd like to start off by asking you about the theme of this event, is innovating together connectivity that matters. What makes connectivity meaningful in your opinion, and why is it important? Yeah, connectivity is very meaningful because in the whole ICT ecosystem, I think this is the most important issue that connects the people, connects government, connects businesses. And the whole innovation ecosystem also works around connectivity. Without connectivity, we can't talk about ICTs. So that's the importance of connectivity in the ICT ecosystem. And what's the role of small and medium-sized enterprises and startups in driving the digital economy, in your opinion? Mainly, especially in developing countries, you'll find that medium and small enterprises are the major drivers of the economy. If they're the major drivers of the economy, and ICT now is becoming the key drivers of most of these economies. So it goes without saying that since most of the businesses in developing countries are small and medium enterprises, and ICT is driving these economies, so actually most of these ICT campaigns actually can be characterised as small and medium enterprises, so they are the drivers of the economy and they're very, very important to our economy. Let's talk about Uganda. What are the challenges faced in developing a healthy innovation ecosystem, and how's Uganda addressing these challenges? First, the major challenge, I think, is the immature innovation ecosystem. The innovation ecosystem is so wide and needs a lot of babysitting, if you may, for some time, right from the universities, the public sector, government policy, financing, all these. To me, the ecosystem is too immature. It needs to reach a level of maturity where it can drive the innovation, so that one is a major challenge. Of course, the other secondary challenge is everybody will talk about the financing lack of financing, sometimes productivity, regulations and government policy, all those challenges, but to me, it's the ecosystem. The whole ecosystem hasn't developed to a level where it will drive innovation to a level which you may want, like you see in Europe or in America or in China, in developing countries, especially in Uganda, the ecosystem still. We don't have these venture capitalists, you don't find them. Enjoy investors, if you want. The strategic institutions like the military plays a very, very big role in innovation and is still immature. So that level of maturity of the ecosystem, I think, is still the major challenge. And what do you think has got the greatest potential to really drive forward digital transformation in Africa? I think the whole thing, again, depends on the one, the e-government, uptake of e-government services. It unlocks. When you enhance that, it will unlock a lot of potential within the innovation ecosystem. For example, the issue of open data policy is still a very, very big challenge in most of the countries. Financing, public finances towards the innovation sector is still a very, very big challenge. But in Uganda, like you asked, we are trying to unlock these by trying as much as we can to put up innovation hubs. Actually, government is putting up one at one of the strategic institution called Uganda Information and Communication Technology Institute in Uganda. And we want to have these innovation hubs in every region, or the four regions in the country. Universities are coming up, and government is expanding on public universities. So far, I think we have about 11 public universities. The issue of innovations in public universities is put a lot of resources are being put in universities to make sure that they produce the necessary talent who can lead in the innovation cycle. And finally, very briefly, what's the value for you of attending events such as IT Utilicon World 2019? Main connections, connections, you get a lot of connections. You hear from the best. You try to benchmark the institutional arrangement of the ITU where they bring together the best. You share experiences, and you find where you have got to trying to up your act so that you come up to the mark. Yeah. Thank you very much for joining us in the studio. Thank you. Hopefully, we'll catch up with you again some settings in the very near future. Yes, sure. Thank you. Thanks a lot.