Rural communities shut out of the global digital community will get respite in the next three years with respect to ubiquitous access to efficient and affordable broadband services. The Universal Service Provision Fund (USPF) says it has concluded plans to deploy its Backbone Infrastructure Project (BTRAIN) Pilot Project. BTRAIN is a 1000km-fibre backbone infrastructure project under which USPF and is providing subsidy to accelerate the build-out of backbone transmission infrastructure to all local government areas in Nigeria. A survey conducted by MTN revealed that over 850 villages had never had access to any form of telecoms services. Consequently, the federal government has designed a five year programme for the USPF to develop rural Information Communications Technology (ICT) connectivity across Nigeria. The USPF organised a one-day industry consultative forum in Lagos to provide stakeholders with an opportunity to make inputs and assist in properly defining the direction of the Fund’s activities in the next five years. Speaking at the event, Omobola Johnson, minister of communications technology who is also the Chairman of the Fund’s board revealed that the Nigerian Communications Act 2003 placed significant responsibilities on the USPF to not only facilitate universal access to communication and applications services, but to also promote greater social and cultural development in Nigeria. “The USPF’s role has never been more crucial as Nigeria is poised to create a broadband revolution, so the programmes considered by USPF could give our country the push it needs to become a truly digitized nation”, he noted. The USPF said it would drive increasing access to community-based data and voice service on a shared basis by establishing additional Community Communication Centres (CCC) across the country, embarking on Schools Access Project (SAP) and Tertiary Institution Project (TIAP), with the specific intention of subsidising the costs of providing internet services, ICT equipments to identified target population on a shared or individual basis. According to a draft management plan covering the next five years between 2013 – 2017 released by USPF, it also reviewed its projects over the last five years noting that it has covered considerable ground in some its projects including the Community Communication Centers (CCCs) planned to provide shared access to telephone and internet services in rural areas. USPF says it has subsidised a total of 224 CCCs across the six zones of Nigeria achieving 77 percent of their set targets of building 291 CCCs across the six geo-political zones across the country. The fund disclosed that it has implemented its Rural Broadband Initiative (RUBI) in 18 Local Government Areas (LGAs) to facilitate easier access to high speed internet. In her presentation at the forum, Yetunde Kanu, senior manager, management consulting, KPMG, consultants in the development of the USPF five year strategic plan, noted that the Fund would carry out relevant researches and studies to determine the market efficiency and true access gap within the country. “We will have a detailed mapping of ICT infrastructure in the country. Other outcomes of the study would also be the determination and quantification of the true access gap where the USPF may focus its interventions.” Highlighting some of strategic objectives of the USPF in line with its new strategic plan (2013 – 2017), Kanu pointed out that USPF would provide subsidies or other forms of incentives to telecommunications operators and eligible service providers to extend ICT transmission infrastructure to identified unserved and underserved communities across the country. According to the KPMG manager, the USPF would also explore opportunities to deploy a full suite of universal access and service initiatives to build utilisation and sustainability of ICT projects. “USPF will encourage community ownership of universal service projects and consequently, promote entrepreneurship in target communities”, she stated. In recent times, mobile network operators have expressed reservations about the lack operator buy-in in the implementation of USPF projects. According to them, there are no set targets and time- lines in terms of implementation. Osondu Nwokoro, head of regulatory affairs for Airtel told Business Day recently that, “There should be a list clearly stating and delineating those areas in Nigeria that are unserved or underserved, so that requisite funds could be delivered to them for the deployment of telecoms services. Rural telephony must be target and performance driven.” Abdullahi Maikano, secretary of USPF said that going forward the USPF would consult with key players in the telecoms industry to identify the barriers and issues which prevent the market from functioning effectively. Stakeholder recommended that the USPF makes provision for subsidizing ICT equipments such as laptops, mobile phones to promote the usage of ICT services deployed in target areas. - Businessdayonline
↧