President Leonel Fernández formally inaugurated the first phase of the Las Americas Technology Institute on Sunday. President Fernández said that the ITLA marks the start of a new era of development and new economic paradigm for the Dominican Republic. "The global economy of which the DR is part is subject to permanent challenges, and the success stories of yesterday, the success stories of today are not inevitably the success stories of the future," he said. He encouraged the new government authorities to continue advances in the computer lab program in public schools and the installation of Internet facilities in far away rural communities. He said that the DR is subject to continuous changes and the ITLA and the Santo Domingo Cyberpark are the first steps of the DR to move from a labor intensive industrial model to one based on knowledge. The government invested RD$133.2 million in the first phase of the Cyberpark.
