UNCTAD recomienda usar software open-source

As I just reported, the chilean government is increasingly being locked by Microsoft, a trend clearly against common sense. In fact, the United Nations just released the "E-Commerce and Development Report", recommending the adoption of open-source and free software by development countries. Some extracts of the report related to open-source are:

"The advantages for developing countries of promoting policy that will provide a positive environment for open-source IT are manifold, and any differences in comparison with the developed world are generally ones of degree, not of direction."

"ICT development may need to include an FOSS agenda. While its low cost does not drive the development of FOSS globally, in developing countries it may well speed adoption, particularly given the increasingly stringent enforcement of IPR demanded by proprietary FOSS software producers. Money spent on licenses may be better used in training ICT experts who can perform real software development, rather than just “click on the menu”.

"Finally, the increasing adoption of FOSS in the developed world is creating export opportunities for customized software from nascent IT industries in developing countries."

The full report is at http://www.unctad.org/en/docs//ecdr2003_en.pdf