huridocs-tech United Nations Projects 300 Million "Hits" on its Web Site

Title: MEDIA: United Nations Projects 300 Million "Hits" on
its Web Site

By Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS, May 4 (IPS) - The United Nations is
projecting over 300 million "hits" on its web site this
year, about seven times more than in 1997.

"The popularity of the UN web site (www.un.org) continues to
grow at a phenomenal pace," says Kensaku Hogen,
Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public
Information.

The number of hits have continued to rise: from 42 million
in 1997 and 97 million in 1998 to 182 million last year.

Hogen says the United Nations now routinely receives more
than a million accesses a day, with a projection of over 300
million by the end of this year. But these 300 million hits,
however, have come mostly from 48 out of the 188 member
states in the world body. Last year, UN Secretary-General
Kofi Annan admitted that about 90 percent of all accesses to
the UN web site comes from industrial countries.

As a result, developing nations have urged the United
Nations not to abandon the traditional media in favour of
the information superhighway. In disseminating news to the
outside world, the United Nations has been asked to
strengthen its output through the radio and the print media
despite its increasing emphasis on the Internet.

Addressing the UN Committee on Information Tuesday, Hogen
said the Department of Public Information (DPI) would take a
dramatic step this year towards direct dissemination of
major UN news stories to radio stations around the world in
all six official languages - English, French, Russian,
Chinese, Spanish and Arabic.

So far, he said, more than 100 radio stations in 58 mostly
developing countries, have expressed interest in the UN's
proposed new project.

Hogen told the Committee that the DPI had re-deployed about
1.8 million dollars to develop a UN international radio
broadcasting capacity. "This would not have been possible
without airtime partnerships established with local,
national and international radio stations and networks in
all regions," he added.

Responding to fears expressed by several developing nations
that the print media would be supplanted by the electronic
media, Hogen said that his department plans to allocate
about 90 percent of its resources to the traditional media.

But the huge allocation to the traditional media, he argued,
would not undermine the United Nations' commitment to
exploit fully the powerful reach and impact of the Internet.

"While Internet access emanated principally from the
industrial world," he admitted, "the day is not too far
distant when the medium will become a wide bandwidth channel
for delivering top quality sound and pictures into living
rooms around the world." The United Nations is also planning
to create its own news service to feed the world's
newspapers and radio and television stations, by the end of
this year.

Salim Lone, Director of the UN's News and Media Division,
told IPS that the proposed news service is not meant to
compete with international news agencies or wire services.
He said the whole exercise would be regionally-tailored.

"We will provide additional information and backgrounders on
stories already on news agency wires," he said. These would
include full texts of speeches made by delegates, UN reports
and studies, and background information to supplement
existing news stories - all of which will be tailored to the
specific needs of each region.

All this information is to be transmitted via e-mail to news
organisations, radio stations and TV stations, mostly in the
developing world. "We plan to take the UN direct to each
editor's desk," he added.

Lone said that some of the information provided will be on
thematic issues - such as human rights, children,
population, and development.

The UN Information Centres are currently compiling mailing
lists of editors and reporters who have shown an interest in
receiving the news service.

Addressing the Committee on Information, Ambassador Anwarul
Karim Chowdhury of Bangladesh said that in the development
of a new culture of communication at the United Nations, it
is important to promote an overall positive image of the
organisation.

"My delegation particularly commends the DPI for developing
and maintaining a very useful and attractive web site of the
United Nations," he said.

But Chowdhury pointed out that UN information should more
aggressively publicise the UN's activities and
accomplishments in the field of social and economic
development,  a major preoccupation of the world body.

Sustainable human development issues, such as poverty
eradication, health, education, women's rights and
empowerment, as well as other social issues of relevance,
should receive additional information.

More use of the radio and television, as well as the
establishment of a UN news service, could serve that
purpose, he added.

Chowdhury, however, said that UN press releases should bring
out the intergovernmental aspect of the organisation's work
and deliberations. At present, he complained, press releases
were too focused on the Secretariat's role.
(END/IPS/MC/td/da/00)




----------------------------------
Send mail for the 'huridocs-tech' list to <huridocs-tech@hrea.org>.
Mail administrative requests to <majordomo@hrea.org>.
For additional assistance, send mail to: <owner-huridocs-tech@hrea.org>.
Archives of previous messages posted to the list can be found at:
http://www.hrea.org/lists/huridocs-tech/markup/maillist.html