{"id":14429,"date":"2012-06-04T12:40:02","date_gmt":"2012-06-04T10:40:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=14429"},"modified":"2012-06-04T12:42:32","modified_gmt":"2012-06-04T10:42:32","slug":"sa-pulled-out-of-obscurity-by-ict-pule","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/14429\/sa-pulled-out-of-obscurity-by-ict-pule\/","title":{"rendered":"SA pulled out of obscurity by ICT: Pule"},"content":{"rendered":"

South Africa is using information and communication technologies (ICT) to pull itself out of obscurity, Communications Minister Dina Pule<\/a> said on Monday.<\/p>\n

“South Africa’s information technology sector is a leader in the fields of electronic banking services, pre-payment, revenue management and fraud prevention systems, and in the manufacture of set-top boxes (STBs).<\/p>\n

“All of these technologies are successfully exported to Africa and the rest of the world.”<\/p>\n

Pule was speaking at the inaugural ICT Indaba in Cape Town.<\/p>\n

She said the local manufacturing of set-top boxes would enhance the country’s leadership position in technology and create many jobs across the continent as “factories go up to manufacture the boxes”.<\/p>\n

The STBs would be needed to receive a digital signal on old-style analogue broadcast television sets. Digital migration was expected to be completed by June 2015.<\/p>\n

The Democratic Alliance<\/a> had previously criticised the department for insisting on the local creation of STBs as it was apparently cheaper to import them.<\/p>\n

DA MP Marian Shinn said in March that it was highly unlikely that the deadline for a digital switchover would be met if government remained committed to local manufacturing.<\/p>\n

“Within a few years most South Africans will likely have bought digital televisions, and sales of analogue sets for which STBs are necessary will cease,” Shinn said.<\/p>\n

Pule also made mention of the pay TV market, saying that she would monitor its progress to ensure diverse broadcasting services were accessible to all citizens.<\/p>\n

Related articles:<\/h3>\n

Tweet away says DoC<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Study critical of SA govt ICT spend<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Up to R90b needed to connect South Africa<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Africa is using information and communication technologies (ICT) to pull itself out of obscurity, Communications Minister Dina Pule said on Monday<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":11914,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[25,2061,1083,2093],"class_list":["post-14429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-active","tag-democratic-alliance","tag-dina-pule","tag-marian-shinn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14429"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14433,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14429\/revisions\/14433"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}