Dionisia Tabureguci


International connectivity is the biggest stumbling block for the development of ICT in Tonga, a senior government official told ISLANDS BUSINESS.
The island kingdom hosted the February’s Pacific ICT Ministerial Forum, organised by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and attended by a throng of representatives from Pacific member governments of ITU, regional and overseas ICT communities, donor agencies, telecommunications companies and civil society.  
The workshop ran with the theme: “Connecting the Unconnected.”
High on the agenda of the two-day meet were connectivity issues in the Pacific as well as the role of governments as policymakers and regulators, and the challenges they face in a fast changing telecommunications market environment in the region.  
With Tonga being the Pacific’s earliest example of a competitive telecommunications market, it has long enjoyed the benefits of open competition.
“Tonga introduced competition in 2002 when it allowed the second mobile telephone provider (TonFon, previously locally owned and acquired by Digicel in 2007) to compete against the government-owned telecom company,” said Alfred Soakai, deputy secretary at Tonga’s Department of Communications.
“Before that, we were paying US$1.50 per minute for overseas calls and 99 seniti (US$0.43 cents) for local mobile calls. After competition, we saw the rate fall right down to about US$0.35 cents a minute for overseas calls and 13 seniti (US$0.05 cents) for local mobile calls. We also saw a considerable increase in teledensity or the number of telephones per 100 population, and also the introduction of new services, better coverage and more choices for the people. So competition has been very positive for us,” said Soakai.
However, taking the wider benefits of ICT to the Tongan people and economy has been an effort curtailed largely by the steep costs of satellite connectivity.  
“Tonga is like most other countries in the Pacific, except maybe Fiji and Papua New Guinea. We don’t have access to a fibre optic submarine cable.  So one of the stumbling blocks for us when we talk about development of the ICT sector in general is international connectivity, ie: the high cost of satellite bandwidth that we have to pay.
“But having said that, I think we have the right foundation in place already in terms of policies. We have our national ICT policy, which was prepared last year as well as a draft ICT Strategic Plan.  The most important thing is the political will to take that step,” Soakai added.
Tonga’s ICT policy document outlines the island kingdom’s ambition to “build us all a ‘Connected Kingdom’—an ICT fale—for our family, our community, our nation and our future.”
It draws a parallel between developing this “Connected Kingdom” to the building of a traditional fale and outlines six supporting pous or pillars for the national ICT programme.
The policy intent is summarised in its National ICT Vision, which is to “maximise the power and versatility of global connectivity to create a knowledge-based society; increasing innovation, accelerating development of our nation and improving the quality of life of all Tongans.
“Tonga will become an active participant in the networked economy; local companies will prosper and new jobs created.  
“ICT will allow us all to learn, share and grow; and assist us in preserving our cherished Tongan culture and values.”
Soakai said efforts were underway to create more community awareness of the policy and the usefulness of ICT with the immediate project being the compilation of a national database for Tonga’s elections office.
“We are trying to complement the work of the Supervisor of Elections by digitising the electoral roll for our national general elections next year.”
But even with such a sure way forward, tackling the international connectivity issue has not been an easy task.
Soakai said Tonga, like other Pacific islands nations, was exploring a range of option including the South Pacific Information Network (SPIN), an undersea Internet cable project that is said to have the support of a number of countries in the region.
“SPIN is really quite expensive for us but they (the project developers SPIN SA) have been very accommodating and have kept the door open for us and other countries for further negotiations.  
“The cost to a country really depends on how far away it is from the backbone (of the cable network).  There are other options, for example the new satellite initiative O3B. If that works, then it would be very good for small countries like Tonga, Kiribati, Tuvalu. To some extent, even though everyone wants to get on a cable network, we will always need satellite links for rural communication as well as for redundancy, in case there’s a disruption on the cable, we would still have a means for international communication.”
The O3B project is fast gaining traction and stirring interest in the Pacific region because of its perceived potential to bring lower cost satellite bandwidth to the unconnected world.
“O3B” according to its developers O3B Networks, stands for the “other 3 billion” or the portion of the world’s population that still do not have access to the Internet.
Soakai said Tonga was also looking at “a more cost-effective option” which is to directly connect to the Southern Cross Cable Network via Fiji.
“It’s an option that was put forward to us at the PITA (Pacific Islands Telecommunications Association) AGM in Palau last year, for an unrepeated cable link from Tonga to Fiji. I think the cost was US$18 million.
“It’s a more cost effective price for us with other things considered such as the terms and conditions of the contract, maintenance options, etc.”