|
|
|
PITA Completes 2002 Action Plan As a result on the on going process of PITA strategic planning which has engaged board members, PITA staff and others from the IT sector in Palestine. The strategic plan, the first of its kind for the private Palestinian sector, reflects the current situation requirements the sector most urgently needs. Five key area were identified as the center of PITA activities for this year which are: Policy advocacy was one of the areas which require our attention; the program of policy advocacy is crowded indeed. The advocacy program includes the following running issues: Public utilities performance, Telecommunication regulations and policies, public tendering, Business practice and codes of continued on page 2 In the news PITA office is blockaded by Israeli Tanks Since early December 2001 we did not have access to our offices in Ersal Street Ramallah, this due to Israeli blockade and the permanent presence of Israeli tanks and soldiers in and around the building which houses our offices. Recently two of the occupants of the building, namely the Ministry of Ex-detainees and Global Management consultant, were able to gain entry to their offices in the building. Both have reported broken doors and windows, ransacking of office, files, materials and furniture and most worrying to us is the theft of office hardware, such as PC, laptops, telephone and fax equipment … etc Ten days ago PITA went to the DCO offices in Ramallah (the Palestinian-Israeli liaison office) to obtain a permission to enter our offices but so far we are unsuccessful. We still not sure what will be left in the office, as it has been reported to us that the door of our office in broken and is wide open. However, PITA operation has continued as normal as it can be possible, most files are stored in soft forms and retrived from other location but others such as financial accounting files are not accessible. =========================
Message of Support for President Arafat As part of Private sector representatives delegation of PITA Board headed by Chairman of the Board visited President Arafat with a message of Support and solidarity Next Issue COMDEX JEDDAH 1-4 APRIL 2002 ethics, Policies on Human Resources development Institutional Development and member services, this to advance PITA capabilities and to match this year ambitious plan The establishment of Gaza office and development of pita HQ in Ramallah, staff training, member’s directory, health insurance program, member’s survey and general assembly meetings are activities under this title. As for PITA marketing activities attending exhibitions and organization trade missions; Gitex Dubai 2002, Comdex Jeddah 2002, CeBit Hannover 2002 (this has been cancelled due to the current situation), the establishment of Dubai Internet City (DIC) Office , Website development, Market intelligence and cross sector business development in side Palestine. A program of firm level Assistance Business Development is designed See lists of LOAs with DAI, Training program for members. The IT Awareness and image building which includes Newsletter, Magazine, Annual IT show, Annual reception to recognize achievements and contribution to IT sector in Palestine. Development of Human Resources program includes; Seminar program, IT specialist training program, student training (See training programs in this Issue) $140K Training programs from the UNDP As part of its program for the development of IT human resources, PITA has signed two memorandums of understanding (MoU) with the UNDP to organized training programs for IT graduates. The first is to retrain employees of IT companies in Gaza. Five courses are offered which are on Cisco, Linux I, Linux II and A+( General Technician ). 60 employees in Gaza are to benefit from the above courses. Training has already started early this month. The second program runs in all of the PNA territories including Jerusalem, through which IT and IT related companies (members and non-members) are encouraged to employ recent graduates in IT disciplines. PITA will meet half the salary of $300 for each graduate up to 3 months and renewable to further 3 months. If businesses see that the graduate requires further formal training off the job, then PITA will grant up to $1000 towards this formal training in exchange the company offers this graduate employment for one year. Application forms have already in process, the first week of February the first group is hoped to start their on job training. Its hoped that 70 un-employed graduates will benefit from this program. 3 LOAs Signed with DAI PITA Chairman of the Board Ibrahim Barham and DAI Chief of Party Said Abuhijleh have singed 3 LOAs. The LOAs provides funding for technical assistance to IT companies to improve management techniques and standardization, Marketing and image building and funding to PITA membership in the World IT services alliance (WITSA) and PITA attendance of the next the World Congress on Information Technology 2002 (WCIT2002) to be held on 27 Feb- 1 March 2002 in Adelaide, Australia. 3 new members joined PITA this month. Castlesoft of Gaza, Borders Integrated Systems & Telecom, Gaza and Hi-Teck, Ramallah, have joined PITA in January. See members database, PITA home page. PITA elected to the Regional UN ICT Task Force launched in Amman Same Bahour of Applied Information System have been selected by the BoD to represent PITA at UN ICT Arab Task force held in Amman Jordan 13-14 January 2002. Sam was elected as a representative of PITA to the Arab Network connected to the UN ICT Task Force. For more details, please visit PITA website, links page. PITA new member of Staff As from 27 January Ameed Awad has join PITA staff, Ameed will be in charge of PITA website and will follow up training program. Ameed is a Birzeit University graduate of Computer Science and Management he is experienced in developing websites. Regional incentives & Local banking services workshop A workshop titled: “IT Incentives in the Region & Local Banking Services” held in Ramallah, Grad park hotel Thursday 31 January 2002. Speakers were from Massar Associates, DAI and Palestinian Banking Corporation The first workshop for year 2002 reviewed the up coming PITA programs such as policy advocacy and firm level assistance. A study of regional incentives to IT industry in neighboring countries presented. A similar meeting to be arranged in Gaza soon. Gaza Office in planned PITA BoD has approved a plan to open PITA office to provide badly needed services to members in Gaza. Work is underway to recruit coordinator to manage this office, the coordinator will be initially housed at the place of sister organization until funds are secured to rent office in Gaza; PITA management is discussing with several organization the possibility of hosting the office.
E-News Contact Information Telephone: 02 296 1988 Fax: 02 296 4121 Email: news@pita-palestine.org Mailing Lists: board@pita-palestine.org , Board only members@pita-palestine.org, All Members staff@pita-palestine.org , All Staff info@pita-palestine.org, selected members of staff pita@pita-palestine.org , selected members of staff Looking a head · Dubai Trade Mission 2 March 2002 · DIC office Palestine@DIC during Mission · Comdex Jeddah 1-4 April 2002
Please send us your activities to post in this space
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
