Investments, Industry and Information Technology Minister Austin Gatt yesterday appealed to Maltese internet service providers (ISPs) to lower their broadband access prices, which he said was essential if Malta is to reach its full information technology potential.

Speaking before a group of ICT sector stakeholders gathered under the umbrella of the National Information Society Advisory Council yesterday, Dr Gatt observed that broadband prices in Malta are much higher than those on the European continent and that there is clearly room for Maltese ISPs to reduce their prices.

While Malta was doing well in terms of overall internet penetration rates, Dr Gatt remarked, and the only thing keeping the general public’s broadband penetration rates down was the price element.

If Malta is to attract further investment in new technologies and reach its goal of becoming a centre of excellence in the area by 2015, Dr Gatt added, broadband access for the public had to become as natural as “drinking a glass of water or milk”.

By 2010 the government intends more than doubling the number of information and communication technology graduates from Maltese institutions, seeing hundreds of public service clerical workers being liberated by the complete roll-out of e-government services and moving into new areas of work, attracting 200 hi-tech companies to invest in Malta, and to e-enable every classroom in Malta.

But the meeting of such goals will depend on the broadband access issue, as well as on boosting Malta’s international connectivity. Malta can no longer rely on the two pipelines – one belonging to Go and another to Vodafone – connecting the country to the rest of the world, he said, and that more redundancy needs to built in to the current set-up.

The ministry yesterday unveiled a set of 183 proposals for Malta’s information and communication technology to the national Information Society Advisory Council. Industry stakeholders will have until 8 December to provide their feedback on the government’s proposals, after which the Cabinet is expected will move ahead with the publication of a final plan for the three-year period.

Among the proposals are targets to increase the number of ICT graduates from the current record of 600 per year to 1,500 by 2010. The final phases of the e-government system, of which 90 per cent has been implemented so far, will also liberate hundreds of clerical public service workers and allow them to move on to other tasks.

The system, he added, would be fully integrated with the public service and would not act as a stand-alone system.

As part of e-enabling Malta’s schools, students and teachers the proposals include the provision of two computers to every classroom, as well as broadband wireless networks for all schools in Malta.

In terms of health, although there had been difficulties in the awarding of the tender for the information technology system at Mater Dei hospital, Dr Gatt remarked that the state-of-the-art system had been implemented on time and would allow the roll-out of Malta’s planned e-Health system to be unique in the world.

The next step toward the goal, he said, would be the integrated exchange of information between Mater Dei and Malta’s policlinics, following which would be the setting up of interconnections with the offices of Malta’s general practitioners.

The government has also set a target of attracting 200 companies of quality, creating up to 4,000 new jobs in the process, to invest in Malta growing ICT sector.

Such investment, Dr Gatt suggested, would come from fellow EU countries, as well as the Indian sub-continent and the Far East.

He also said there were good prospects from countries such as Russia and the Ukraine, which were seeking footholds closer to the EU.

The government envisages the roll-out of electronic identification cards by 2009.

Such cards would contain a chip holding personal details, which would allow for an easier flow of work and services at government departments and the future implementation of an electronic wallet system.

Such targets, Dr Gatt said, were not pipe dreams but, rather, achievable goals.

Earlier plans, which today have been achieved, had been described as excessively ambitious at the time they had been announced, but today there was ample proof that what had been targeted had been achieved. “The proof of the pudding,” he said, “was in the eating.”