UNCTAD: A new statistical Website to help developing countries use ICT to stimulate Economic growth.

According to a recent press release published by UNCTAD, the organization has developed a new statistical Website to help developing countries use Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) to stimulate Economic growth. Twelve years ago, a young Brazilian woman started a swimwear factory with an investment of US$1,000. Continuous improvement in managerial skills, and the use of such tools as e-commerce, has turned the undertaking into a successful enterprise that now has 20 employees and exports 35% of its products to Europe and the United States. The process has been boosted by Government policies intended to encourage the adoption of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) by Brazilian firms, and Government officials have been monitoring the effectiveness of their policies by collecting and analyzing statistics. To capitalize on the opportunities ICT offers, and to enable Governments to make informed decisions that increase ICT´s impact on economic growth, UNCTAD has expanded its efforts to help developing countries collect statistics and set up effective ICT policies. The UNCTAD subsite http://measuring-ict.unctad.org has been redesigned to better match national statistical offices (NSOs) needs in offering key information on ICT data collection and dissemination.