NDP calls for co-ordinated e-strategy
The structural conflict of interest between the state’s role as a competitive player in the market through its majority share in Telkom, and as a policy-maker for itself and its competitors, will need to be overcome if South Africa is to fulfil its e-strategy vision.
This was the finding of the National Development Plan (NDP) , which was handed over to the Presidency by planning minister Trevor Manuel on Wednesday (15 August).
“It will be important to clarify the institutional arrangements to remove some of the tensions in the sector. Better distinction of roles and functions, more coherent approaches and clearer strategies will be required to avoid unintended policy outcomes,” the NDP said.
“A national e-strategy will cut across government departments and sectors,” it said.
Government’s Information and Communication Technology (ICT) vision would only be realised only if it was supported by a co-ordinated, enabling ICT strategy and plan, the document said.
The e-strategy would need public and private investments in areas such as network upgrade and extension; particularly in broadband; service delivery and application development; and local content development.
“This will require a review of the market structure, and analysis of the benefits and costs of infrastructure duplication, facilities or service-based competition, and options for infrastructure sharing.”
“It will also need a common carrier network, with possibilities of structural separation of the vertically integrated incumbent backbone operator. Carefully-applied open-access policies can incentivise sharing and common use of certain layers of the network, without discouraging private long-term investment.”
It would also require targeted public investment, possibly through public/private partnerships, the document said.
Phasing
The document pointed to the phasing of priorities for a move to an enabling ICT reality by 2030.
Short term: 2012-2015
The document stated the case for a clear and urgent need for a full policy review, which has not been done in the ICT sector since 1995.
In the next five years, South Africa needs to develop a more comprehensive and integrated e-strategy that reflects the cross-cutting nature of ICTs.
“This should link policy objectives to specific strategies. It would include plans to allocate a new spectrum that will become available with the switch to digital broadcasting, and would set out a strategy for universal access, with clear targets and monitoring and evaluation indicators,” the NPC said.
“In addition, it would outline demand stimulation interventions such as e-literacy programmes, skills development and institutional capacity-building strategies, and other generic demand-side interventions to promote ICT diffusion requiring interdepartmental and public and private coordination,” it continued.
For sector policy, specifically, evidence suggested that national objectives of affordable access to the array of services necessary for effective citizenship, and globally competitive input prices for business, were best achieved through effectively regulated competitive markets.
According to the NPC, the following areas required attention:
- Adjust the market structures and remove legal constraints to enable full competition in services;
- Fast-track local loop unbundling (LLU);
- Review institutional arrangements to ensure the existence of resourced regulatory agencies able to encourage market entry and fair competition and to regulate market failure;
- Implement a service and technology-neutral flexible licensing regime to allow flexible use of resources in dynamic and innovative sectors, especially for spectrum that should be made available urgently for next generation services;
- Free spectrum for efficient use, to drive down costs and stimulate innovation;
- Spectrum can be allocated with set asides or obligations to overcome historical legacies and inequalities in the sector, but this should not delay its competitive allocation;
- Ensure access to low-cost high-speed international bandwidth with open access policies;
- Facilitate the development of high bandwidth backbone/backhaul networks;
- Review SOEs to determine if they are fulfilling their purposes, constraining competition, squeezing out private investment or not engaged in efficient expansion;
- Examine the ability of the market to sustain infrastructure (facilities) competition and whether the benefits outweigh the duplication of facilities in a resource-constrained environment;
- Identify alternatives to infrastructure competition through structural separation of the national backbone from the services offered by the historical incumbent to create a common carrier with open access policies to ensure access by service competitors;
- Consider inefficiencies of infrastructure duplication and encourage or prescribe sharing and reduction of expensive trenching by creating common rights of way for competing operators to lay dedicated lines.
The implementation plan derived from this policy review will include a comprehensive short-, medium- and long-term investment strategy based on the needs of the sector:
- Conduct a geographical information assessment of existing networks and future rollout coordination;
- Consider public and private roles;
- Review institutional arrangements to create an environment conducive to investment and to ensure the effective regulation of the sector.
It would also identify the need for specific demand-side strategies in other sectors and identify the institutions responsible for developing and putting them into operation. This would include targeted training to meet South Africa’s specific needs, with development of e-workers and e-consumers to grow services and create decent employment, such as business process outsourcing and offshore information technology-enabled services from abroad.
Medium term: 2015-2020
The commission supports the target proposed by the Department of Communication (DoC) – by 2020, there should be 100% broadband penetration. All schools, health facilities and similar social institutions will be connected and individual citizens will have affordable access to information and services, as well as voice communication at appropriate points.
Broadband is currently defined as a minimum connection speed of 256 kilobytes per second, but it is expected that by 2020 this will be at least two megabytes per second.
“Because there is substantial uncertainty about the pace of technological development and the level of services that will be available in 2020, it is appropriate to benchmark South Africa’s performance against other countries, rather than to set firm numerical targets.”
By 2020, through strategic investment and regulatory guidance, the costs associated with access to services by the commercial, public and community sectors should place South Africa’s relative costs in the upper quartile of country-specific ICT costs worldwide.
With both planning and delivery, South Africa should regain its position as the leader in both quality and cost of ICT services in Africa.
Long term: 2020-2030
The ongoing implementation and refinement of the e-strategy would ensure that ICT supports, rather than limits, the global competitiveness of South Africa and its economic performers.
By 2030, government would make extensive use of ICT to engage with and provide services to citizens. “All individuals will be able to use a core of ICT services and enjoy access to a wide range of entertainment, information and educational services.”
By 2030, the e-strategy collaborations between state, industry and academia would also create innovation systems, including software and applications incubators, local content and multimedia hubs and research and development networks.
“These systems will be used to plan for and respond to the wider needs of the global ICT ecosystem, of which South Africa will be an integral part.”
The full document can be found here.
Related articles
NDP targets 16% unemployment by 2020
Telkom has not discussed delisting
Loading ...