Buea recently hosted a two-day workshop to optimise the effectiveness of the Internet.

Experts in the Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are unanimous that the sector can generate much resource for the State like other productive sectors of the economy.

The disclosure was made in Buea on 11 July during the start of a two-day restitution workshop organised by the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunication and the National Agency for Information and Communication Technologies (ANTIC) with the support from the World Bank.

The project dubbed “Central African Backbone” (CAB) falls within the framework of implementing optic fibre to interconnect the entire Central African sub region concluded by CEMAC Heads of State in Ndjamena, Chad in 2007.

According to the General Manager of ANTIC, Dr. Ebot Ebot Enaw, the objectives of the Buea workshop was to replicate what others have done successfully in other countries in terms of best practices into Cameroon.

The workshop, Dr. Ebot Ebot added, was to give them a clear vision on what to do to improve and optimise the management of .cm so that it can contribute effectively to the emergence of Cameroon by 2035.

“Today ANTIC is a registry and it sells domain names through twelve (12) registrars and these 12 registrars have the responsibility to contact users who want to buy domain names.

We regulate the management of the .cm (dot cm) domain, we regulate the internet at large including security aspects relating to the governance of the internet”, ANTIC GM stated.

William Tita a consultant and expert at the workshop posited that .cm is a resource to the State.

He said the name.cm gives Cameroon an area (real estate) in space to be able to accomplish certain objectives.

He added that .cm is the window of Cameroon to the virtual world and the door through which the virtual world gets into Cameroon. According to him, .cm is an important resource for the government comparing what it can generate to that of oil and agricultural sectors.