During the December 2008 Tsunami Aceh, Indonesia found itself cut off from the rest of the world - all communication infrastructure were destroyed save the a amateur radio and the last mile technology, WiMAX, that enabled communication flow to the rest of the world, for the rescue of the victims.
This was a repeat. During the swirling Hurricane Katrina, Intel Corporation called upon WiMAX to assist FCC and FEMA in making communication a reality – to save life and property.
WiMAX which was coined during the WiMAX Forum in June 2001, to promote conformity and interoperability of the standard in the technological world; is out to enthusiastically bridge the Information Communication Technological (ICT) divide that is in existence between Africa and the developed world. The digital divide has been growing with the passage of time encoded in the ripple of the global village that has caught Africa pants down.
The Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) dubbed as the last mile in wireless broadband access is highly propagated by the East Africa communication gate keepers, that is, the Communication Commissions of the respective countries, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania prior to the arrival of the communication cable at shore of the Indian ocean, Mombasa.
The Africa Advanced Level Telecommunication Institute (AFRALTI), an Inter-Governmental human resource took the initiative in gluing a regional conference with the helping hand of governmental and private firms and institutions in communications to raise an arena, to deliberate on gaping digital divide between Africa, and the rest of the world.
In his opening remark during the 1st East Africa WiMAX conference,2009, that was dubbed as 'Bridging the Digital Divide Through Mobile Internet,' the minister for information and communications Hon. Samuel Poghisio said that the new technology is a new approach to help leapfrog Africa from its old impediments. “WiMAX, one of these new technologies, is a powerful new IMT-2000-complaint technology with much potential for delivering wireless Internet affordable, and across difficult terrain.”
The minister highlighted that technologies like WiMAX have the potential of changing the third world technological landscape tremendously. “WiMAX technology has the potential to deliver higher coverage hence accessibility; lower costs to consumers, and higher bandwidths. Subsequently this means increased broadband penetration in the region,” Poghisio said.
WiMAX is said to have advantage over existing technologies as it provides wireless data transmission using a variety of transmission modes, from point – to – multi point links, to potable and fully mobile Internet access. Yes, the technology provides up to 72 Mbites symmetric broadband speed without the need of a cable.
Thus the ministry of information and communications is seeing this as an opportunity “to make the promise of WiMAX a reality,” as they are out to foster a “conducive regulation and spectrum allocation, sound business models, proven equipment and a rich ecosystem of applications and supporting technologies.” Phogosio applauded WiMAX as it's coming at an opportune time when the developments for harnessing such services are ripe.
The minister articulated of the digital villages being established across the country “will utilise WiMAX frequencies.” He explained that the terrestrial cable being laid countrywide with be the backbone and WiMAX will complement it in the last mile on a wide range of about 50 km.
Kenya was relatively highly rated in Internet usage from among a pool of developing countries: According to a recent World Bank report titled, Africa Infrastructure: A Time Transformation, notwithstanding the cost of accessing Internet being relatively higher in comparison to other part of the world. But Internet usage results is a hue and cry as users in Africa were picking from a decimal 5.6 percentage, in comparison with 48.5, 59.9 and 73.1 of Europe, Australia and America respectively, in 2000.
“Currently, Internet subscribers are 3.4 million against a population of over 35 million,” here in Kenya said Mr. Charles Njoroge the director general of communications and commission of Kenya, attributing such alarming statistics to “high cost of access.”
“There is no doubt that Kenya's appetite for enhanced communication services is growing, and hence much more investment in versatile technologies are necessary,” Njoroge said, that that is why “WiMAX presents itself as a low cost measure which also greatly minimizes the time and complexity of implementing a broadband system in urban and rural areas a like.”
Njoroge said that with the arrival of the cable, WiMAX will have an opportunity for deployment in an even wider scale. Thus raising economic development a notch higher by “bring to reality the universality of ICT facilities, and assist us compete on an equal footing with the developed world.”
The CCK director demystified that, “Kenya has 7 operators (in 3.5 GHs frequency band) and 4 (in 3.3 GHs frequency band) who have deployed WiMAX services in Kenya. CCK will continue to assign the available frequency spectrum, type – approve the equipment to be deployed, and assure that the equipment is operating according to assigned parameters.”
He promised that they will avail additional spectrum for new services, and migrate existing radio systems in the 2.3 and 2.5 GHs frequency bands. The interested parties have been alarmed that any frequency that will be released will be based “on competitive market based mechanisms given competing demands for the targeted frequencies.”
Denis Libena, the deputy director of spectrum management , Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) pointed out that unused spectrum is like a farm that the private sector need to re-farm it's potential, urgently; his Uganda counterpart, Geoffrey Sengendo, evaluated how WiMAX is proving to be a magic wand in Uganda's economy and communications sector.
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