On October 7, 2010, the election of the new leadership of the international telecommunications union (ITU) was held in Mexico. Zhao Houlin, the adjunct professor of ZJU, was re-elected Deputy Secretary-General with 155 votes out of 157 countries present and voting
Mr Zhao graduated from Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications, China, in 1975. Between 1979 and 1980, he studied as a visiting scholar in Switzerland. He joined the University of Essex (United Kingdom) in 1984, where he obtained a Master of Science degree in Telematics in 1985. He took an active part in his country's experts meetings on national telecommunication standards as well as in various national projects. He received a prize in 1985 for his science and technology achievements in the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications. Between 1982 and 1983, he participated in CCITT Study Group meetings as a Chinese delegate and joined the CCITT Secretariat (now TSB) in 1986. He was elected as Director of TSB in 1998, and re-elected to this post at the Marrakesh Plenipotentiary Conference in 2002. He was elected Deputy Secretary-General at the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference in Antalya, Turkey, in November 2006.
In his two terms as Director of TSB (1999-2006), he introduced effective and efficient measures to improve ITU's standards environment and strengthened its promotion. He also enhanced the strategic partnership between Member States and Sector Members, while initiating and maintaining good relations with industry members. Under his leadership, ITU’s Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) facilitated international cooperation with other standards development organizations and forums and helped bridge the standardization gap between the developing and developed countries
The ITU is a specialized agency that is responsible for global information and telecommunications affairs in the United Nations system. It was established in 1865 and was headquartered in Geneva. The ITU leadership has five members: secretary-general, deputy secretary-general, the director of telecom standardization, the director of the wireless communication and the director of the telecommunications development. According to the regulation, five persons are all elected by the members of ITU. Each can be elected as the same position for two consecutive periods. One period is 4 years.
