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Michael Taylor

Time has run out for talking about the Y2K problem, a United States expert has warned.

  'We're at the stage when we need to go beyond awareness and focus on action,' John Koskinen, head of the President's Council on Year 2000 Conversion, was quoted as saying in an Associated Press report.

  Mr Koskinen was addressing about 150 experts from the Asia- Pacific Economic Co-operation Forum, who were gathered in Singapore for a conference on the problem.

  Mr Koskinen called for a more solution-oriented approach, noting there are 'only 254 days to go' until the end of the year.

  'We must be moving on from discussing the nature of the problem and simply sharing the information,' Mr Koskinen said.

  He said main problems in the region should be identified and solutions should be sought.

  'We need to focus in depth on specific problems, such as transportation, energy, telecommunications and financial services,' he said.

  Mr Koskinen's warnings came just one day after the United States Government predicted the greatest threat to America from the Year 2000 glitch could come from computer failures overseas.

 In another key speech at the Singapore gathering, Takeo Shiina, head of Japan's Y2K Advisors' Conference, said it was 'very important' for the region to make contingency plans.

  Not only governments and businesses but also individuals should have plans in case failures did occur, he said.

  'Every family should have its own contingency plans' to avoid panicking and social unrest, Mr Shiina said.

 According to the Far Eastern Economic Review, countries such as the United States, Australia, Britain and Canada are best prepared to deal with the Y2K problem. Within Asia, Hong Kong and Singapore were best prepared.

  'In fact, both cities are well into the most advanced stage of Y2K preparation, planning for 'what if' scenarios should systems still go awry,' the magazine said.

  Countries such as Japan, India and Malaysia, however, were far less prepared.

  The mainland, meanwhile, could face 'social chaos, the loss of foreign investment and the risk of creating unintended international consequences', a World Bank official was quoted in the magazine as saying.

  The Y2K problem is the result of computer programming which might not distinguish between the years 1900 and 2000. When computers were first built in the 1950s, they were much less sophisticated than they are today. To save on memory, dates were simplified to two-digit numbers. Thus 1999 became 99 and 2000 became 00.

  No one knows how computers will react when the year 2000 arrives. How many will get confused, thinking it is really the year 1900? Only time will tell.



Call for action on Y2K problem