On 19th and 20th September 2005, experts from all over the world came to Turin to share their views and discuss the topic of “Financing Cooperation to Bridge the Digital Divide”.
A great effort was made at this International meeting to build and consolidate relations between participants from different sectors including Local Authorities, NGOs, Corporations, Universities and International Organizations.
“Financing Cooperation to Bridge the Digital Divide” was the mainline of the conference and was prominent on banners behind more than 60 high-level speakers and a total of 200 participants from over 21 countries.
At six workshops and two keynote sessions, speakers focused their attention on how they were financing their projects and the results that they had currently achieved.
The workshops were aimed at describing the situation concerning the main issues of the Digital Divide, both at national and international levels; though different points of view were expressed, all participants agreed that people need to be further empowered and that a reduction of technical, social, political and economical barriers is needed to overlap the Digital Divide.
In some cases opinions differed widely but, due to there being an urgent need to reduce the Digital Divide worldwide, the necessity to build bridges became very clear.
The aim of the Turin Conference was to encourage dialogueand share experiences rather than offer solutions. Bearing in mind these guidelines, the overall outcome may be considered successful, though better results could be achieved in the future through greater collaboration between all participants and the Cooperation Agency for Local Authorities.
“Financing Cooperation to Bridge the Digital Divide” was also an occasion to confirm, stress and strengthen Turin’s role regarding exchanging experiences and points of view on Information Society issues.

Outcome of the Turin Conference
The primary outcome of the Turin Conference is both process and output orientated, a “living document”, which conference speakers and participants contributed to create thanks to their interventions. The document will be presented at the Bilbao Conference – from 9th to 11th November 2005 – and will be sent electronically to all participants.
Turin, through its ability to develop an enabling environment where concrete actions towards the reduction, through e-governance projects, of the Digital Divide may be considered, has confirmed its position as a focal point for discussions. This effort aims at concentrating on the exploration of public sector performance and how e-governance fosters new and deeper citizen involvement within the governing process.