Robert Karayev – Professor, Head of Laboratory of Ecological Processes Modeling, Institute of Cybernetics, National Academy of Sciences of Azerbaijan.
Address: 9, B.Vagabadze str., Baku, Azerbaijan
E-mail: karayevr@rambler.ru

The article deals with estimating the current state and development prospects of the information and communication technologies (ICT) in Azerbaijan in the framework of standard and policy documents of the Government of Azerbaijan, reflecting the mission of ICT at the stage of the Republic’s transition from resource exporting economy to resources-and-innovations ("non-oil") economy.

The main purpose of the search was to evaluate the possibility of further the country's ICT development to that of the developed countries, and to identify factors for further development of the industry in the context of the Government’s program "Development Concept "Azerbaijan – 2020: the Vision of the Future ".

ICT Development Index (IDI), proposed in 2007 by International Telecommunication Union  (ITU), was chosen as the key tool for evaluating and forecasting the development. The index was. IDI reflects the overall progress of certain countries towards forming the information society, and now it is widely used in the international evaluating practice.

The research showed that in 2011 the IDI levels for developing countries were for about half  of those of the developed countries, while the relative growth rates of the developing countries were much higher. Azerbaijan is one of the 10 countries with the highest IDI. From 2002 to 2010, Azerbaijan’s rating rose by eight positions – from the 100th to 74th place, while the absolute value of the index increased by 2.07 – from 1.71 to 3.78, which is above average IDI growth for the group under study. The article analyzes the methodology and results of comparative forecasting of the IDI trends change in the top 20 countries of the world and in Azerbaijan.

The research points out the necessity to consider the dynamics of IDI and of the development of the whole ICT sector as part of a systematic approach that takes into account Azerbaijan’s critical factors of ICT management. It gives a high evaluation to the possibility of using the paradigm of foresight forecast ("collective archetype" of the future), and several effective support tools such as dynamic PEST & SWOT analysis, methods of strategic and scenario planning, as well as the technology of cognitive modeling, making today a promising component of “NBIC-convergence”.