Italian Government Gets To Work On Y2K

Updated 4:30 PM ET September 8, 1999

ROME (Reuters) - Italian government ministers met to discuss the millennium bug Wednesday amid fears the country's public sector will not be ready to meet the challenges of Y2K.

Deputy Prime Minister Franco Bassanini sat down with representatives of all the major ministries at an opening sitting of the government's Interministerial Committee for the Year 2000, a statement from the prime minister's office said.

The committee is due to discuss all aspects of Y2K, a problem of how dates are read by computers and computer systems. The concern is that "00" at the end of 2000 may be misread as 1900, causing computers to malfunction.

Committee president Ernesto Bettinelli warned in June that the Italian state sector was lagging far behind the banking system and stock exchange in dealing with the potential problem.

"We've been able to identify an alarming state of unawareness in a large part of minor state administration departments," Bettinelli said then.

U.S. consultants Caper Jones have estimated the Italian state sector will have to spend around 25 trillion lire ($1.3 billion) on upgrading computer systems to combat the bug.

The private sector in Italy is much better prepared.

The central bank has said over 90 percent of the financial and banking system is ready for Y2K while Italy's stock exchange watchdog Consob has said it does not expect quoted companies to face any problems linked with the millennium bug on the bourse.

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Ray

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), September 08, 1999

Answers

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/19990908/tc/italy_yk_1.html

-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), September 08, 1999.

It was their OPENING meeting.

Got olive oil?

-- Dog Gone (layinglow@rollover.now), September 08, 1999.

Thank God. For a minute there, I was scared they would wait until the last minute.

-- a (a@a.a), September 08, 1999.

Flashback: 1999-05-15

Italy Is Going to Crash, Says Italian Y2K Official

-- dangermouse (dontbeinitaly@y2k.to), September 08, 1999.

a:

Thanks for the laugh.....

Maybe they should wait and have the rest of the meetings on 12-31-99, just before going out to the New Year's Eve celebrations.......

-- Jon Williamson (pssomerville@sprintmail.com), September 08, 1999.

My landsmen! Not prepared? How can that be?!! First eat, then worry about the computer. Oh well, domani maybe.

-- Casey DeFranco (caseyd@silcom.com), September 08, 1999.