ID # G29
Status of the Internet in Pacific Island Countries
Franck Martin
Network and Database Developer
SOPAC
Suva, Fiji
Franck@sopac.org

Introduction

The Pacific or rather the Pacific Island Countries (PICs) is a very challenging place for communications. First it is important to make the difference with the Pacific Rim (countries on the border of the Pacific Ocean) and the Asia Pacific Region (Asian Countries). The PICs stretch over an area as big as Africa for a population of about 4 million. This area is composed of many islands with more than a thousand languages. The only fast means of travel between countries is by plane, which is quite expensive for the average earner. The other mean of communication is using the phone, fax and now the Internet. However the Internet has been slow to penetrate the region. This is mainly due to the size of the economies, the wide areas to be covered, and also because there are many barriers when introducing a new technology.

However many aid programs are in place to try to develop the Internet in the region, unfortunately many are linked to the Asia-Pacific region which creates a disparity in terms of funding, and resources.

Telecommunication networks

Satellite

The Pacific region is mainly covered by the Intelsat series of satellite using band C. There are 3 Intelsat satellite that covers PICs. PanamSat 2 is the only alternative satellite but it covers only the western part of the region, mainly Australia and New Zealand. Around Fiji, 6m dishes are required. The situation could have changed with the launch of ORION but this failed. However Intelsat is re-positioning its satellites in the region and is now providing a Ku band service in the western part of the PIC (Australia to Fiji) and in French Polynesia.

Cables

The south Pacific does not have many undersea cables. They link Australia and New Zealand to USA via Hawaii or they cross one side of the Pacific to the other side without even landing in any PIC. They also link the American territories, but for military reasons. These cables are from the old technology, made of copper with very small capacity in this digital era. The only major development in the region is the Southern Cross Cable. This is an undersea fibre optic cable that links Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, California and Fiji. The capacity of the cable is 12Gb/s split over 3 optic fibres. If this cable is a technological greatness, it may mean nothing for Fiji if it is not linked with a drastic price reduction.

Semi-private networks

Peacesat

Peacesat is a free network established in the late 80s by the University of Hawaii using an old meteorological satellite. The communication was audio, sometime duplex audio using Band L. There was also the possibility to send files at 9600bauds using modems. This was later used to establish Internet sessions and to transmit e-mails using UUCP or other equivalent protocols. An upgrade was envisaged where the system would allow digital data transfer to speed up to 32kb/s. However this upgrade came late at prices that were prohibitive.

USPNet

USPNet was established in 2000 to link the University of the South Pacific to all its centres. It is composed of permanent full duplex 64kbps links to the centres of Vanuatu, Tonga, Nauru, Kiribati, Samoa, Niue, Tokelau, Tuvalu, Cook Islands, Fiji, Marshall Islands. Additionally there are 4 128kbps channels which allows the transmission of video. It can be 4 simultaneous broadcasts or 2 videoconferences. This network allows tele-education at all levels with all the students in the Pacific. However the system is reserved by agreement with the countries and the telecommunication industry to the exclusive use of USP.

Mercure

Mercure is a UNEP network linking UNEP offices and environment department in the world. The proposed Pacific nodes could be an extension to the network in a similar manner as the USPNet network.

Internet in Countries

Internet is not well understood in the Pacific. Therefore it had various success. Most of the countries in the Pacific have links from 64kbps to 1Mbps to USA, Honk Kong, Australia or New Zealand via satellite. Because of the providers the price of Internet is various. For instance for many years New Zealand has been charging by volume its Internet. This affected the development of Internet in Fiji which was charged by volume too. In Australia, Telstra today is charging a monthly fee plus a volume rate if a certain amount of volume is reached.

The current pattern of Internet access is mainly directed towards USA sites (60-70%). When PIC’s upstream ISP is a country outside USA, then the bandwidth has to be shared with all the users of this country.

Moreover because countries have to pay for a leased line to the USA (all traffic in and out of USA), one can say that Pacific Island Countries are subsidising the Internet in the USA.

You can refer to the charts at the end of this document to compare the prices practised in the Pacific with other countries. You can also see a reduction of the Internet in certain PIC, denoting a real government action. There is such initiative in French Polynesia, by removing all taxes on computers and providing to all the islands asymmetric Internet via Intelsat Ku band and a local ISP. There are also some propositions in this sense in Niue.

The role of Regional Organisations

The regional organisations have always identified the requirement for an affordable and reliable communication network which would enables them to serve the needs of the member countries in a cost effective and timely manner.

The Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA), in particular, saw the need for such a network as the backbone to a surveillance and enforcement program that is fundamental to the effective management of the resource. This resulted, during the late 1980s, in an investigation of alternative technologies to the then costly and unreliable Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) for transfer of voice and data. Trials were conducted using HF radio, leased PSTN circuits and satellites as the technology while early tests were made using the Internet transport between FFA and SPC, Noumeá. It should be noted that Internet was then restricted to academia and the military. These tests resulted in the implementation of the PEACESAT (satellite) network for the fisheries resource sector and a parallel Inmarsat (satellite) project for maritime surveillance. The stage had thus been set for regional organisations to become involved in alternative technologies for communications to assist in development of PICs. Predicably, the established telecommunications companies (telcos) became agitated at a perceived loss of revenue and a disturbance to their long enjoyed monopolies They named these alternative technologies: “bypass” services.

Throughout this development period several regional organisations had commenced implementing electronic mail (e-mail) on a regional wide basis via PEACESAT (FFA) or had integrated e-mail into their corporate networks (SOPAC).

Domain Names

The Pacific owns some very interesting domains. These domains are fm (federated States of Micronesia, to (Tonga), ki (Kiribati) as energy in chinese, ws (Samoa) as web site or wall street, nu (niue) as new or now in Dutch, and tv (Tuvalu). These domains have a huge market potential, which is beyond their area of use. For most of these countries this represents an important resource alternative. If you take the case of Tuvalu, which is a country of about 10,000 people, the tv domain can generate about US$2 million a year in payments to Tuvalu or about USD100 per inhabitant per year. This is the net revenue to the country as predicted by the term of agreement with the company charged to manage to tv domain in California. Even for a country like Pitcairn (pn) which domain name as not much interest and whose population is about 47 people (no mistake here), they succeed to have about 2000-4000 domain registered, because many companies tend to register their trademark globally on all the country top-level domain names. The sale generated is then about USD100, 000 per year or about USD2000 per inhabitant per year.

When you know that these countries have not many resources, and that their development is difficult, to see the ICANN driven by the USA, trying to remove these extra sales from the domain names is utterly outrageous! And to add to the problem these countries are not aware of the ICANN and have difficulty to attend the meetings to raise their voice in the USA.

Solutions?

At the difference of Water or Electricity, it seems that many Pacific Island Countries (PICs) consider Telecommunication as a luxury product. It seems that they set up a monopolistic structure to protect the investments in infrastructure. However many got mixed up between running a company and providing a public service. It means that quite often the government is owner and regulator, an often-blatant conflict of interest.

It is true that in the term of PICs, investment can be quite high for little profit. It seems that many Telecommunication companies have benefited of the differential of calls to and from the country, which often result in a positive benefit for the local Telecommunication companies. The USA are currently trying to change this pricing structure with a lot of resistance from PICs. However someone may say that if the balance is in favour of PICs for normal Telephony, it is in huge favour for the Internet. PICs have to rent leased line to the closest ISP, which mainly in the Pacific are on the West Coast of the USA.

However if the government does not play its role of regulator but contemplate itself as a shareholder, then the Telecommunication industry becomes quickly a taxation department: Profits are maximised for return to the shareholders. For instance it is not rare to see a profit/equity ratio of 40% in certain companies and profit/turnover ratio of 20%.

What is important is the role of Telecommunication in developed countries. If keeping a monopoly is what will benefit the most the development of the country so be it, but if it is competition many barriers need to be broken. In all case some transparent and public reporting could help map an accurate picture to other investors but mainly to the population. A few key indicators are needed, outside the costs of telecommunications, which certainly do not reflect the country situation. These key factors would ensure peer review and public pressure to establish better communications.

Such key factors are mainly:

·         List of companies and ownership

·         Turnover, profit, dividend, equity, tax and the ratios profit/turnover, profit/equity… These indicators could be compared to other sectors in the country itself.

·         Technology and equipment employed, to assess the level of development and the age of the infrastructure.

·         Quality keys: phone waiting list number, average waiting period, number of fault lodged. All by-products sold.

·         Comparison keys: coverage to be compared with other sectors coverage like road, water and electricity.

All these key factors will indicate the involvement of the regulator or company in the development of telecommunications.

In terms of national infrastructures, costs are high and penetration slow, but the international market is much simpler. However Intelsat by its structure operates in concert with monopolies and refuse to provide pricing to potential investors. However this is slowly changing with the privatisation of Intelsat In many countries the Intelsat correspondent is the telecommunication company rather than the regulator. This requires to be changed so that the international market can be deregulated first. A VSAT operation can cost as low as USD50, 000 in investment, allowing any company to enter in business and resell through the local loop. However due to the geographical situation only Intelsat is available.

Leapfrog is important too, so that latest and cheap technology can be deployed. In many cases the Pacific is the dumping ground of old technology not anymore sellable in developed country. It is important to train decision makers in the benefit of new technologies.

It is also important to train decision makers that telecommunication is not a matter for the exclusivity of telecommunication workers, and that input from all stakeholders are more important, than from the industry. Public polls on the situation could reveal surprises as how the public perceive the services. Public polls often present an objective view if properly conducted with a representative section of the population.

Finally the national network can be deregulated, under the condition of a defined Universal Service Obligation Policy (USO). As UAP is a utopia, it is therefore important to define the level up to UAP is considered reached. The UAP can also be divided in zones: urban centres, rural areas, and remote islands.

One of the common statements concerning UAP is to keep a national monopoly so that the profitable urban centres can pay for the non-profitable rural areas, but in terms of development, by providing low communication costs to urban areas will it benefit rural areas, which will have more money to pay for a less profitable service.

It is also important to promote cross-bridging technologies for the infrastructure, which helps covering the areas much faster. For instance electrical cables with a fibre optic core could convey high-speed communication, while covering at the same time areas with Electricity and Telecommunication. Feeding a telecommunication signal on the electrical cable could provide the last metre to the user. Finally wireless network at the price of fixed networks could cover quickly island countries with on central equipment, which is not subject to laying and maintaining cables in unstable grounds.

Frameworks need to be put in place where government establishes discussion and action plans that are not whish lists but concrete actions to be taken in a defined interval. Training could be provided or incentives to encourage PICs establishing public action plans.

Charts

Fixed Line Telephony in Pacific Island Countries

Source: Telecommunications- The Pacific Link 1998

Telecommunication Interests in Pacific Island Countries

Source: PITA (1998) SOPAC (2000)

Internet Users in Pacific Island Countries

Sources: Forum Secretariat survey of PITA members (May 2000); UNDP (1999)

Summary of Prices for Internet Access in the Pacific

Source: SOPAC 1997

Source: Forum Secretariat survey of PITA members (May 2000), SOPAC (1999)

References

Ogden, M.R., “Islands on the Internet”, Pacific Telecommunications Review, 4^th quarter 1999 (internet document: http://www.ptc.org/pubs/ptr/4q99/ogden.html)

 Parsons Galloway Foundation.  Pacific Island Involvement in the Global Information Infrastructure, South Pacific Forum Secretariat, May 1998  

SOPAC.  Internet Access Pricing in the Pacific.  Suva Fiji: South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission, 1999

 Forum Secretariat.  The Global Information Infrastructure – Electronic Commerce Applications.  Circular 326/98.  1998

 Forum Secretariat.  Forum Communication Policy Ministerial Meeting Action Plan.  April 1999 

Pacific Islands Regional Association for Distance Education  Appropriate Telecommunication and Learning Technology for Distance Education in the South Pacific  December 2000