While most people have been enjoying a summer break, it's been a busy month for us. Here’s an overview of AFRINIC’s news and activities throughout August.

 

 

 

 

 

Monthly Statistics

New Members in August: 19

Total New members in 2016: 122 

IPv4 address space allocated in August: 735,488 /32

Total IPv4 allocated to date in 2016 : 7,366,656 /32

IPv6 address space allocated in August: 9 IPv6 prefixes (regardless of size)

Total IPv6 allocated to date in 2016: 71 Pv6 prefixes (regardless of size)

ASNs allocated in August: 19

Total ASNs allocated to date in 2016: 115 

News and Activities 

2 August: 2015 Annual Report Published

 

Read the AFRINIC Annual Report 2015.

 

 

 

3 August: AFRINIC-25 Fellowship Applications Opened

The AFRINIC Fellowship Programme provides opportunities for individuals from African countries who have an interest in Internet operations and governance to participate in AFRINIC-25. The fellowship provides basic financial assistance to applicants who fulfill the eligibility criteria and who are subsequently selected by the Fellowship Committee. Successful fellows will receive an award to partially cover travel and living expenses associated with attending AFRINIC-25. The selected fellow is expected to actively contribute to Internet Number Resource Management awareness in the AFRINIC service region prior, during and after the meeting. He/She is also expected to provide reports on how this fellowship has benefited his/her organisation/country. The applications round closed on 29 August and applications from 47 African nations were received. Find out more here. 

5 August: 2016 FIRE Awards Applications Opened

AFRINIC announced the opening of the 2016 FIRE Awards and encouraged anyone working on innovative ICT projects that contribute to sustainable development in Africa to apply.  The FIRE Awards are granted to initiatives already completed or in their final implementation phase, aligned with the three funding categories:

• Technical innovation for Internet access and development.
• Internet and technologies for social inclusion, strengthening democracy and the exercise of rights and freedoms.
• Internet and technology for social and economic development. 

Selected winners will receive a project prize of USD 3,000 plus full travel and accommodation for one representative of each project to attend the awards ceremony, and participate in sessions which will be held in Mexico during the 2016 Internet Governance Forum (IGF). The application round closed on 2 September, 2016. Find out more here.

12 August: Moving to the Consolidated Policy Manual

AFRINIC announced that it would be adopting the Consolidated Policy Manual on 15 September 2016. After this date, all individual implemented policies will be archived. The Manual is a single document where all currently active policies (implemented) have been moved and integrated to make it easier for community members to look up and read through active policy, as well as eliminate complexity in the policy update process. Find out more here.

12 August: The ICG Launched Call for Comments on IANA IPR Agreements

The IANA Stewardship Transition Coordination Group (ICG) launched a call for public comment from the numbering community on three agreements concerning intellectual property rights (IPR) related to the IANA stewardship transition:

• IANA IPR Assignment Agreement
• IANA IPR License Agreement
• IANA IPR Community Agreement

The deadline for input is September 12, 2016 at 23:59 UTC and comments should be submitted via email to: IANAIPRpubliccomment[at]ianacg.org. Find out more about this here.

16 August: Appointments to the IANA Numbering Services Review Committee

AFRINIC announced the following initial members of the IANA Numbering Services Review Committee:

• Fiona Asonga (community representative, until 31 December 2016)
• Douglas Onyango (community representative, until 31 December 2017)
• Madhvi Gokool (staff representative, until further notice)

The two community representatives are automatically appointed to the IANA Numbering Services Review Committee as a result of their appointment to the NRO NC/ASO AC.  The staff representative is appointed by AFRINIC's CEO. Find out more about the Committee here.

16 August: IANA Announces Exhaustion of 16-bit ASN Pool

The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) announced that its 16-bit Autonomous System Number (ASN) pool has now been exhausted. Future allocations to the five Regional Internet Registries will be made from the IANA's 32-bit pool. AFRINIC assigns all AS Numbers from its 32-bit ASN pool. It has a small supply of 16-bit ASNs available and, due to the incompatibility of some equipment with the higher bit order 32-bit ASNs, it may allow, on a case-by-case basis, members to swap higher bit ASNs with lower bit order 32-bit ASNs. However, AFRINIC strongly encourages members to check for 32-bit ASN functionality before purchasing new equipment, and to upgrade current non-compliant equipment in order to support the 32-bit ASN standard so that they can connect to customers as well as connect with their upstream providers. Read the full announcement here.

17 August: NTIA Announces Intention to allow IANA Functions Contract to Expire 

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced its intention to allow the IANA Functions Contract to expire,representing the final step in an 18 year process to transition the Internet’s domain name system (DNS) to the private sector. The NTIA currently contracts ICANN to perform the IANA functions. Over the last two years Internet stakeholder groups from around the world came together to formulate a comprehensive plan to transition the US Government out of its historical oversight role. AFRINIC community representatives and staff, together with the other four RIRs, worked tirelessly as part of the Numbers community to contribute to the plan to ensure that the Internet remains open, stable, resilient and secure. AFRINIC fully supports the IANA Stewardship Transition and would like to thank all of those who have contributed their time over the last two years. You can read more about this announcement and the AFRINIC community's work on this here.

18 August: Registration for AFRINIC-25 Open

We opened registration for the AFRINIC-25 Meeting, being held at the Sofitel Imperial Resort & Spa in Mauritius, from 25 - 30 November 2016. Workshops and tutorials will take place from 25 - 27 November 2016 and the plenary sessions/policy discussions will be held from 28 - 30 November 2016. Registered already? Let us know on social media - we're using the #AFRINIC25 hashtag. 

We strongly advise that you start your travel and visa procedures for Mauritius as from now. For more information about travel and visas please see our online travel kit.

 

 

30 August: AFRINIC Attends AfPIF 2016

The AFRINIC delegation attended AfPIF 2016 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania from 30 August - 1 September. AFRINIC has been a proud sponsor of AfPIF since 2012. In addition to sponsoring AfPIF, AFRINIC regularly contributes to the forum programme by sending staff to the event to present on topics such as Internet number resource management and traffic flow measurement. Find out more about AFRINIC and AfPIF's unique partnership in this blog post. You can also read a wrap up from the event here.

31 August: New Database Working Group (DBWG) Created

At the end of the month AFRINIC announced that it has set up a Database Working Group to provide a platform for technical discussions around the WHOIS database and related services. We encourage everyone to subscribe to the mailing list and read the draft WG Charter. Find out more about the DBWG here.

Training Highlights

Three AFRINIC Training Courses were held in August: 

Accra, Ghana,

• 36 participants attended the IPv6 & INRM Training Course in Accra, Ghana from 9 - 12 August.
• Local Host: University of Ghana
• View the course Storify

Lagos, Nigeria:

• 39 participants attended the IPv6 & INRM Training Course in Lagos, Nigeria from 23 - 26 August 2016.
• Local host: Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON), Nigeria Internet Registration Association (NiRA), and  Information Technology & Media Services  - University of Ibadan ITeMS
• View the curse Storify

Douala, Cameroon

• 41 participants attended the IPv6 & INRM Training Course in Douala, Cameroon from 30 August - 02 September.
• Local Host: ANTIC
• View the course Storify

 

Blog Highlights

In the last few months, we've been steadily increasing the amount and scope of the content on the AFRINIC Blog. Here are August's content highlights:

• MEWC - Mid-Term Review of the African Women's Decade 2010-2020
  2013 FIRE Africa Award Winner Make Every Woman Count (MEWC) introduces its comprehensive Mid-Term Review in this inspiring article.

• Focus on Senegal: Sénégal : Entrevue avec le Directeur des TIC au Ministère des Postes et Télécommunications

  We meet with the Directer of Senegal's Ministry of Post and Telecommunications (in French only). 

• Agreements on IANA Intellectual Property Rights (IPR)
  CEO Alan Barrett gives us an overview of the IANA IPR documents and why its important that the community has its say.

• The AFRINIC and AfPIF Partnership
  We talked to CEO Alan Barrett about AFRINIC's involvement with AfPIF.

• AfPIF Brings Together Internet Players
  AFRINIC Project Manager Mwendwa Kivuva talks about the key role that AfPIF plays in connecting the African and global Internet community.

Find more on our August events from our storify below.

 

 

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