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From Adanna Nnamani, Abuja
The Federal Government, Association of Telecommunication Companies of Nigeria (ATCON), Nigerian Communications Commission(NCC), National Information Development Agency (NITDA) and other stakeholders met recently in Abuja to brainstorm on practicable ways to achieving 70 per cent broadband penetration target by 2025.
Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami who spoke at the one-day event tagged, “Realizing the New Set Target of 70% of Broadband Penetration”, disclosed that the broadband penetration in Nigeria still stood at 42.7percent as of April 2022.
Pantami represented by Dr Usman Gambo Abdullahi, Director, Information Technology Infrastructure Solution, NITDA, said the Federal Government had set out an ambitious target to deepen broadband penetration in Nigeria under the National Broadband Plan(2020-2025), adding that the implementation of the Plan would contribute to the economic growth of the nation.
He said the Broadband Plan also aims to deliver data download speeds across Nigeria – a minimum of 25Mbps in urban areas, and 10Mbps in rural areas, with effective coverage available to at least 90% of the population by 2025 at a price not more than N390 per 1GB of data (2% of median income or 1% of minimum wage).
The minister however identified lack of access to funding, inefficiencies in the power supply in the country, multiple taxation and regulation, non-conformity with agreed Right-of-Way (RoW) charges, among others as major constraints militating against the implementation of the Plan.
He said there was steady improvement as a result of relentless efforts made to address those challenges and that the government was confident that the figure will continue to increase and surpass the set mid-term target of 50% penetration by 2023.
“Our confidence in this is based on the strength of positive indices in 3G and 4G population coverage which are presently at 83.65% and 62.55% respectively”, the minister said.
Also speaking, the Governor of Lagos State, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, said Lagos State was leading on the ease of doing business index among other sub-nationals as a result of far reaching reforms in critical areas that directly affect the establishment of new businesses and the operation of existing ones within a relatively conducive environment.
Sanwo-Olu who was represented by Bisoye Coker Odusote, General Manager, Lagos State Infrastructure Maintenance and Regulatory Agency (LASIMRA), said as a result of
digitisation of processes and procedures in the State, there has been a reduction of processing period for planning permits from 28 days to 10 days, adding that “we are still working on making the period even shorter.”
Commenting on fibre infrastructure, he said the State has embarked on the deployment of High Density Duct pipes towards achieving the main objectives of creating a technology enabled and sustainable smart city.
“Our objective as a government is to create a technology-driven city by an Open Access Unified Duct/Fibre infrastructure/backbone for up to 3,000km of metro fibre across all local government areas in the State, in the first instance.
“The fibre optics laying will fast track
higher bandwidth which will translate to faster internet speed with stronger security.
“The deployment of the unified fibre duct infrastructure is meant for carrying telecommunications cables and
other wired infrastructure.
“This project will support telecommunications operators and other relevant utilities, as well as the infrastructure required for the Lagos
State Government’s connectivity requirement.
“On our part in Lagos State, we are
committed and will continue to put in the needed effort because, achieving improved broadband penetration is critical to improving ease of doing business and building a more efficient, productive and competitive economy through digitisation,” he assured.
Earlier in his welcome address, President of ATCON, Ikechukwu Nnamani, revealed that the Conference was organised with a view to proffering lasting solutions to issues that are likely to constitute as obstacles to the actualisation of National Broadband Target of 70% before the expiration of the National Broadband Plan 2020-2025.
According to him, “As often the case with us at ATCON, the strategic objectives of this very important event are to complement the various strategic activities already embarked upon by the Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy and all the agencies under the Ministry to achieve the set target of broadband penetration in Nigeria with great speed.
“To leverage the wide spectrum of ATCON’ sub-groups for effective participation in the new Nigerian National Broadband Plan 2020-2025 by giving them the opportunity to access the plan and suggest various ways to speed up the realisation of the established target by the government and also serve as a veritable platform to galvanise the needed input that reflect the thinkings of the telecom and ICT sector.
“This is an opportunity to review the relevance of the Nigerian policy environment vis-a-vis the telecom operating environment.”
