News

The meeting was attended by the representatives of the CAs of Russia, Uzbekistan, IOSC “InterSputnik”, “International Law Association”, RCC Executive Committee.

The Working Group approved the following agenda of the meeting:

1. Consideration of the 1st wording of the draft RCC statutory documents given the comments and proposals received from the RCC Communications Administrations.
2. Improvement of the RCC structure.
3. Inclusion of the question “Working on revision of the RCC statutory documents” to the agenda of the 39th session of the RCC Board in Ashkhabad.

The 1st wording of the draft documents developed by the Law Association given the proposals and comments received as well as the question on the RCC structure improvement were presented to the members of the 1st meeting of the Working Group.

Communications Administrations of Armenia, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan approved the draft documents.

From the Communications Administrations of Belarus, Moldova, Russia, Uzbekistan, IOSC “InterSputnik” comments and proposals were received and considered at the 1st meeting of the Working Group.

The Working Group during the meeting of 4 and 5 September 2008 approved in a whole:

1. Draft Agreement on the International Organization “Regional Commonwealth of Communications”,
2. Explanatory Note to this Agreement.

The Working Group taking into account the introduced amendments has supported the draft decision on this question prepared by the Communications Administration of Belarus.

The Working Group has studied the issue on the RCC structure improvement, it was decided to charge the RCC Executive Committee to arrange the meeting of the RCC working bodies heads at the 39th RCC Board session and to consider the issues on the RCC structure improvement.

• The Working Group according to the appeal of the CA of Belarus addressed the RCC Executive Committee with a request to study with the RCC Board Chairman the possibility of inclusion into the 39th RCC Board session agenda the item “Work on revision of the RCC statutory documents”.
• In case of positive decision the question is to be reported by a member of the Working Group, representative of CA of Uzbekistan – the Chairman of the RCC Commission on the Economy of Communications, Ms. Makhsum Makhmudov, Director of the Centre of Scientific-Technical and Marketing Studies of the Communication and Information Agency of Uzbekistan.

Representatives from CAs of Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Uzbekistan and RCC Executive Committee participated in the meeting. Representatives from Communication and Informatization Regulatory Bodies of the RCC participants’ countries, postal operator FSUE “Russian Post” and telecommunication operator JSC “Kyrgyztelecom” attended the meeting.

Commission considered some questions to the regular 38th RCC Board session, including: draft list of measures to be implemented within the framework of the RCC charter activity, improvement of financial support mechanism for R&D works arrangement and implementation, amendments to the Provisions on Finances of the RCC.

Experience exchange in communication industry of the RCC participants’ countries including: rate of communication services monopolization, liberalization of the communication services market, licensing of ICT complex in the RCC Communications Administrations, ICTs application in postal communications were under consideration.

A wide range of questions related to tariff policy were discussed including: changing normative and legal basis for tariffs regulation on the communication services, experience in tariffs regulation for public communication services and mutual settlements for these services, experience in tariffs formation for IP telephony services and principles of tariffs formation for NGN services.

The outcomes of implementation of R&D work “Indicators characterizing business climate, human capital and state regulation in ICT sphere of the CIS countries and recommendations for filling them in” and other questions were considered.

Next the 21st meeting of the RCC Commission on the Economy of Communication by the invitation of the CA of the Republic of Kazakhstan is planned to be held in March or April 2008 in the Almaty city.

Representatives of Communications Administrations from Belarus, Moldova, Russia, Uzbekistan and RCC Executive Committee attended the meeting.

At the meeting of the Working Group the proposals prepared by the RCC Executive Committee for amendments and additions to the Provisions on Finances of the RCC in connection with expenses for the RCC charter activity at the expense of members’ contributions beginning from 2008 and as a result some changes of the RCC financial activities. Upon the discussion results the Working Group laid down proposals to be considered at the coming meeting of the RCC Commission on the Economy of Communication (11-12 November 2007, Astana, Republic of Kazakhstan).

Besides, the Working Group has charged the RCC Executive Committee to prepare proposals for amendments and additions to other RCC normative documents with the view to bringing into compliance with updated Provisions on Finances of the RCC in case of their adoption by the RCC Board. Amendments have to be introduced, in particular, into the Provision on the Executive Committee of the RCC, Provision on R&D (adopted by the RCC Board, Decision N31/5 of 23 June 2004) and if necessary to other RCC normative documents.

A wide range of questions related to tariff policy were discussed including: changing normative and legal basis for tariffs regulation on the communication services, experience in tariffs regulation for public communication services and mutual settlements for these services, experience in tariffs formation for IP telephony services and principles of tariffs formation for NGN services.

24 representatives from 9 RCC Communications Administrations, regulatory bodies in the field of communications and informatization, telecommunication and postal operators took part in the Commission meeting.

The questions on the economy of the info-communications industry of mutual interest for the RCC CAs were discussed during the meeting.

Experience exchange in communication industry of the RCC participants’ countries including: rate of communication services monopolization, liberalization of the communication services market, licensing of ICT complex in the RCC Communications Administrations, ICTs application in postal communications were under consideration.

One of the important questions of the meeting was the draft List of actions within the RCC Charter activities envisaging implementation of the actions for the benefits of the all RCC participants in future including ones for 2009. The list of actions was prepared according to the Provisions on the RCC Finances, based on the proposals received from the RCC CAs, telecommunication and postal operators, as well as on the recommendations of the RCC working bodies, Coordination Council for Informatization of the CIS member states attached to the RCC. The List was approved by the Commission and recommended for consideration at the 39th RCC Board session.

At the same time the Commission paid great attention to the experience exchange in the following areas: the strategy of communication and informatization industry development for the prospect in some of the RCC participants countries; quality of ICT-based services, using of current corporative management methods by communication operators, liberalization of the market of services in some of the RCC CAs, tariff policy and principles of tariffs formation for the communication services, as well as for the complex of NGN services, postal services, adopted at the RCC participants countries. Commission had adopted the plan of work for the prospect, as well as for the next meeting planned for March-April 2009.

Representatives from the Communications Administrations of the Azerbaijan Republic, Republic of Belarus, Republic of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Republic of Moldova, Russian Federation, Republic of Uzbekistan, Ukraine, and also of the Moscow Research Centre (Russia), CIS Executive Committee and RCC Executive Committee took part in the meeting, 24 participants in all.

Chairmen of the RCC Commissions presided at the meeting: on the Economy of Communications – Makhsum M. Makhmudov, Director of the Center of Scientific and Technical and Marketing Researches of the Communications and Informatization Agency of Uzbekistan, on Informatization – Alexander I. Pankratov, Deputy Head of the Federal Agency for Information Technologies of the Russian Federation.

In the course of the joint meeting of the Commissions the following basic questions were considered: improvement of the financial support mechanism for organization and execution of R&D works within RCC, innovations and high technologies in the communications industry as an important aspect of national economy development, results of the R&D work “Indicators characterizing business climate, human capital, state regulation in the ICT sphere” carrying out and other questions.

A wide range of questions related to tariff policy were discussed including: changing normative and legal basis for tariffs regulation on the communication services, experience in tariffs regulation for public communication services and mutual settlements for these services, experience in tariffs formation for IP telephony services and principles of tariffs formation for NGN services.

The commissions developed specific proposals for improvement of the financial support mechanism for organization and execution of the R&D works at RCC which will be further studied at RCC CAs and it is planned to consider generalized material on this issue at the regular meeting of the RCC Commission on the Economy of Communications with the subsequent presentation of materials to the 38th session of the RCC Board.

Next the 21st meeting of the RCC Commission on the Economy of Communication by the invitation of the CA of the Republic of Kazakhstan is planned to be held in March or April 2008 in the Almaty city.

Within the framework of the question “Innovations and high technologies in the communications industry as an important aspect of national economy development” the report of interest to all RCC Communications Administrations was presented by a representative of the Communications Administration of the Azerbaijan Republic. In this connection, participants of the meeting asked CA of Azerbaijan to make a relevant presentation at the regular session of the Coordination Council (28-29 May 2007, Jurmala, the Republic of Latvia).

Meeting of the RCC Commissions approved proposed within the framework of the R&D work “Indicators characterizing business climate, human capital, state regulation in the ICT sphere” the list of the indicators characterizing business climate, human capital, state regulation in the ICT sphere of the CIS countries, and also recommended to use an indicator “Place of the country in the rating of the countries by the international composite indexes of readiness for “e-development”. The Commissions considered it expedient, after completion of this R&D work, to continue with works on expansion of the list of the approved indicators characterizing “e-development” of the CIS countries, and to finish methodical recommendations for their filling in.

In conclusion of the joint meeting Chairmen of the Commissions on behalf of participants thanked the leadership and employees of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technologies of the Azerbaijan Republic for good organization of the Commissions’ meetings and also for creation of businesslike and creative conditions for the work.

On 21-22 March 2007 the regular meeting of the Working Group attached to the RCC Telecommunication Operators Board on mutual settlements between the RCC CAs operators for the international telecommunication services within CIS will be held.

The following questions will be considered at the meeting:

1. State of settlements with the RCC operators (CIS) for the international telecommunication services as of 1 January 2007 for purposes of preparations for the 20th meeting of the RCC Telecommunication Operators Board.

2. Existing practice of mutual settlements between operators of fixed and mobile communication for mutual access to networks for the purpose of preparation of the question for the 19th meeting of the RCC Commission on the Economy of Communications.

3. Execution of the RCC Telecommunication Operators Board commission on study of the question on changing the settlements procedure between the communication operators (Decision 18/14-14 of 29.03.2006, item 3).

The WG proposals for the question will be submitted for consideration at the 20th meeting of the RCC Telecommunication Operators Board.

4. Activity of the Working Group on mutual settlements between the RCC CAs operators for the international telecommunication services within the CIS attached to the RCC Telecommunication Operators Board.

On 30-31 May 2006 in Moscow upon the decision of the RCC Commission on the Economy of Communications (Decision ¹16/7 of 12-13 May 2005) 2-day seminar “Activity based costing of telecommunication and postal services in the RCC CAs” was held.

Organizers of the seminar were the RCC Executive Committee, Communications Administration of the Russian Federation, Institute of Qualifications Upgrading of Moscow Technical University of Communications and Informatics supported by CA of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

Representatives of Communications Administrations and operators of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Ukraine and RCC Executive Committee participated in the seminar.

Sessions were conducted by communication specialists from the Russian Federation and the Republic of Kazakhstan who were the lecturers at the seminar.

Listeners familiarized themselves with the purposes and tasks of activity based costing, general provisions for communication operators’ activity based costing, recommendations for cost accounting based on activities, services and telecommunication network parts of CA of Russia used for these services provision. The order of activity based costing for communication operators based on the practices of Open JSC “Svyazinvest”, Open JSC “Rostelecom” (Russian Federation) and JSC “Kazakhtelecom”, JSC “Kazpost” (Republic of Kazakhstan) was considered.

The theme of the seminar is rather topical now, projects of activity based costing organization belong to the important economical problem which solution will allow Communications Administrations and Operators to set economically sound tariffs for all communication services, to go away gradually from cross subsidizing, to solve the problems of universal communication services provision.

In conclusion of the seminar the round table was held, the other participants – representatives of Communications Administrations and operators exchanged their experience in work, ways and methods of solution of activity based costing problem locally, talked about achievements and difficulties arising when projects are under realization.

Seminar got high appraisal, the participants expressed their wishes to have qualifications upgrading on this topic within the RCC more often (previous seminar on activity based costing was held in 2001).