Rod Beckstrom, ICANN's President and Chief Executive Officer said today that there is a real need to increase Internet access across the African continent.
"There has been tremendous progress toward greater connectivity. In ten years, the number of Internet users has grown 25-fold," said Beckstrom. "That is rapid growth, yet it still represents only 11.5 percent of the African population."
Beckstrom made his comments during the kick-off of ICANN's 42nd public meeting in Dakar, Senegal.

He told the conference that discussions will take place during the week on how to best provide financial and logistical support to applicants of new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) from developing countries.

"ICANN's global community is already taking steps to help needy applicants apply for new gTLDs," said Beckstrom. "A joint working group has spent many hours working on a proposal that the Board will consider this week on how best to provide that support."

The new gTLD program will vastly expand the number of generic Top-Level Domains from the current 22, which includes such familiar endings as ".com",".net" and ".gov."

Senegal President Abdoulaye Wade told the conference that the Internet is crucial for the growth of African economies.

He also said "the international makeup of ICANN's Board of Directors is crucial and provides legitimacy for its decisions."

The ICANN meeting will end on Friday with a meeting of the Board of Directors.