ICTs & SDGs: Sound Policy & Regulation required for beneficial effects of ICTs

I was deeply impressed with the ITU Publication 'ICT-centric economic growth, innovation and job creation.'

This book has many takeaways. My favourite ones are as follows:

The  publication captures the essence of the undeniable linkages between ICTs and the SDGs. It is both comprehensive and contemporary covering various aspects such as the digital divide, innovation and latest technologies and their connection with sustainable development

In particular, I  support and underline the contention in Chapter 2 that highlights that more emphasis needs to be placed on addressing inequalities in access and usage of ICTs between people and regions which if left unaddressed will exacerbate all other inequalities in development, growth and quality of life over time adversely affecting the progress in realizing the SDGs. The stress on ICT related Targets in SDGs (table 1.) is very important. The measures contained in sub goal 9c must include all disadvantaged persons including Persons with Disabilities (PwDs).

In this context, while governments have a very important role to play, the way forward is a multi-stakeholder model wherein private sector, academia and civil society are actively engaged and involved by governments. I wholeheartedly endorse the importance of good regulation that encourages and facilitates private sector innovation and government support (through inter alia innovative use of Universal Service Funds) to empower the poor, women and PwDs etc. such that they are provided the benefits of ICTs. 

The multi-stakeholder partnership model described in Appendix A to Chapter 2 is very relevant and tried and tested in India in its Sanchar Shakti project  for access to Mobile Value-Added Services for rural women. 

Chapter 4 with its emphasis on a conducive institutional and regulatory framework is highly relevant especially for policy makers and regulators in developing countries. Competition, liberalisation and innovation go hand in hand with sustainable growth. In particular, the trade-off between short term gains and long-term harm caused by policy decisions impacts all sectors including ICTs and has a very important bearing on achieving sustainable development. 

I also appreciate the stress on the capacity of ICTs to empower citizens by providing information and a feedback mechanism to express their views and preferences. The sections on competition, consumer regulation and State owned Enterprises (SoEs) are very well written and pertinent. Competition, credible governance, universal service regulation, privacy and data protection can have a critical impact on, long term growth of ICTs and hence overall socio-economic development given the intricate linkages between ICTs and the SDGs. This is an important precondition for overall balanced growth in international context.

Chapter 5 speaks about new data driven business models based on sharing and personalisation in the context of increasing growth of IoT, multi-sided platforms and the App economy, highlight the need for focus on  important issues such as privacy and data protection and cyber security which are critical to consumer protection, trust and hence uptake of ICTs and their continued contribution to sustainable development.

The Future of Wireless Communication?

An extremely interesting article from the Economist hints at the possibility of bidding farewell to electrical signals as the prime means of wireless communication.

The article explains that chemical based communication as found in nature-animals do it (your dog leaving urine samples replete with telling "chemical markers" at every nook and corner during his walks or internal communications within the human body are examples), could be used to transmit data which would be read by sensors.

Present trials are crude at best, with very low speeds, but there is hope for higher data transmission becoming a reality in the future especially if messages can be encoded in the molecules themselves.

A particularly useful application of such technology is in disaster related search and rescue operations where the situation does not permit normal mobile communications. This happens when a building collapses as mobile services are not of much under the debris. However a group of robots could go under the collapsed material and leave each other chemical messages about what areas were searched and what has been found.

Another lesson to learn is that we should not preemptively put all our eggs in one basket  assuming that a particular technology is the best-please see my post titled "Disruptive Technology and Public Funding of High Speed Broadband Networks." under the label Technology

Renewable Energy for Powering Smart Phones

The Times of India today has an article that reports  that scientists have developed bio-batteries that use sugar to generate electricity enough to power cell phones for 10 days. These batteries are also lighter. In the Indian scenario this would be a boon. At present rural areas face heavy power cuts and people resort to unconventional means such using tractor batteries to charge cell phones.

The smart phone with its potential for job search, education, data, e-commerce  and e-government applications is the primary device though which the average Indian would access ICTs and ICT enabled services. Making it last is vital. Long lasting batteries are also vital from the disaster communications viewpoint.

Disruptive Technology and Public Funding of High Speed Broadband Networks

In my posts on the issue of National Broadband Plan and Broadband  Networks, I have consistently cautioned against creating publicly funded monopolies for OFC Networks and reminded readers about the regulatory issues involved in managing our legacy of wire line based incumbents. One of the reasons for avoiding the same is the nature of telecommunications where technology change is the rule.The advent of affordable  and competitively provided mobile services debunked the notion of telecoms as natural monopolies, yet we risk repeating this faulty argument when it comes to high speed broadband.

In India, the Public Sector Incumbents BSNL and MTNL have been supported with billions of rupees to survive in a competitive environment. However, not even their dominance in wire line telephony has helped them compete with a nimble private sector. On the other hand, regulatory protection of legacy public investment in their wire line networks has had a negative effect on competition in that segment in the country. The result is very poor broadband penetration.

Today's Times of India carries an article about a new laser developed by the California Institute of Technology that promises to greatly  outdo the speed of existing OFC cables (that are based on older S-DBF lasers). This sort of disruption should be expected in telecommunications. There could be many more such developments even before the roll out of nation-wide  OFC network projects which is underway in many counties (like India's NOFN by BBNL) is even completed. What then will be the fate of the sunk (public) investment in these (then) obsolete megalithic OFC networks?

This will inevitably throw up complex regulatory issues such as those described above, with less than optimal results. This brings me back to what I wrote in my posts titled  "Broadband Networks through Infrastructure Sharing" and National Broadband Networks: Regulation, Universal Service, Competition and Monopolies."

We may need to learn from the story about the "Tortoise and the Hare" that we may not win in the long run if in our haste to speed up high speed broadband deployment, we ride roughshod over hard learned lessons about competition and technological neutrality.

Relevant Markets of the Future

It is interesting to think of broadband which people like me have already likened to a bridge across infrastructural gaps as being treated as a substitute to transportation, not for purposes of competition  law jurisdiction as my title may suggest, but at least as a competitor for public funding. 

Thus, a post titled "Building railways not broadband is a ‘strategic mistake" quotes a Microsoft personnel as saying that "The UK government is making “a strategic mistake” investing billions of pounds into railways rather than broadband." The said executive has criticized  "the government for not investing into the technologies needed to make mobile working a reality for more, instead sticking with the traditional investments for the commute to work. “The one negative fact about the future is the current and previous governments think we need to build railways instead of broadband infrastructure and networks,” 

I am not sure that the two investments are mutually exclusive for a country like U.K, but certainly one can envisage that the future would be one where mobile work or tele-commuting predominates. One can quite easily stretch one's imagination to a scenario where the broadband becomes more important than the railways when it comes to interacting with co-workers.

In developing countries broadband already compensates for lack of roads, hospitals, schools, work opportunities, social services etc.  My articles on the subject can be seen here.

Technology and Universal Service

I have two pieces of information to share. Both of them are related to technology and  telecom penetration.

The first is the welcome initiative on the part of the  Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in exploring  the possibility of providing SMS-based mobile banking through a single application on all types of handsets.

It is reported that,

"A Technical Committee on Mobile Banking has been set up to "examine the options/alternatives including the feasibility of using encrypted SMS-based funds transfer using an application that can run on any type of handset for expansion of mobile banking in the country," the central bank said.The panel will conduct an in-depth study of the challenges faced by banks in taking mobile banking forward to the desired level. At the end of July, there were about 70 lakh users of mobile banking, which is currently offered by 78 banks.The panel will also examine "any other optimum solution" that would take mobile banking to every nook and corner of the country, in addition to drawing a road map for implementing the solutions or options recommended."

With mobile penetration outstripping land lines in India and smart phones becoming affordable, this measure could greatly address the yawning financial inclusion gap in the country. As an interesting aside, the promotion of mobile banking  is identified by the Economist as one possible way to reduce channelization of rural household savings into financially less productive assets such as cows, in India! The article is called Udder People's Money and makes for interesting reading. Please also see my previous post on mobile VAS.

The second is news about the use of  television and radio channels to transmit cellular signals when systems are pushed beyond capacity as during a disaster. "Mai Hassan, a PhD student has managed to [change] the shape of the wireless signal so she could transmit on channels that use radio or television frequencies. She then had to change the direction of transmission away from the original channel. Instead of using traditional antennas, which transmit signals in all directions , she used smart antennas in mobile phones. Smart antennas transmit signals in a single direction and can steer the beam to any direction. By manipulating the direction of the cellular signals, Hassan was able to transmit calls and texts to a receiver while avoiding any interference with the original radio and televisions signals."

Please see my previous posts on disaster communications. I am of the view that keeping the public (rather than only official first responders) connected is of critical importance during disasters.

News for USOF India

Apart from its Scheme for its scheme for subsidised Mobile Phones and tablets, USOF India has been in the news lately on two counts.

This is first on account of the telecoms regulator's (TRAI) recent recommendations on improving connectivity in the North Eastern states of India. It is reported that based on Department of Telecom's request, TRAI has suggested inter alia that:

(i) A 2 per cent discount be provided in licence fee, charged annually, of those telecom operators who cover at least 80 per cent of the habitations with a population of 250 and subsidies for installation of solar power units at telecom towers.

(ii) Providing seamless connectivity across National Highways in the North East region covering Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura.

(iii) Providing subsidy from Universal Services Obligation fund for bandwidth charges through satellite connectivity.

Also [t]he regulator has asked state governments in North East to address issues raised by the telecom operators on priority so that they are encouraged to roll-out services faster, provide land, government building, power for mobile towers, single-window clearance system for all telecom related issues among others.

My comments are that this is a welcome initiative. However, I do not find merit in a roll out based discount.  Past experience has shown that roll out is very difficult to establish conclusively. It also tends to encourage fraudulent coverage claims. I would prefer output based subsidy for clearly targeted interventions.

The second news item states that USOF has been asked by DoT for its views on viability gap funding required for achieving DoTs green telecom targets. It is reported that USOF, "is likely to advice the government based on findings of Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) on this issue."

Also that, 

"The telecom department plans to urge Asian Development Bank to extend long-term soft loans to India's cash-strapped telecom sector which has been clamouring for viability gap funding (VGF) as a precondition to invest in capex-intensive green energy technologies mandated by the government. ....Discussions on incentivising green energy were triggered by DoT's refusal to ease targets linked to renewable energy deployment for running towers sites. The green policy requires telcos to migrate 50% of all cell towers in rural areas and 20% in urban areas to hybrid power by 2015. By 2020, operators will need to run 75% and 33% of cell towers in rural and urban zones, respectively, on hybrid supplies. Hybrid power has been defined as a mix of grid supplies and renewable energy based on solar, wind, biomass or fuel cells."

USOF has previously encouraged use of solar and solar-wind hybrid renewable energy in its subsidised mobile infrastructure project but the scheme remained in pilot phase. It also liaised with the Ministry of New and renewable Energy in this regard. There is a DoT report on this subject titled "Hybrid Wind/Solar Power for Rural Telephony- Green Solution to Power Problems" 

The Importance of Being Connected

I quote below from two studies.They highlightsthe importance of connectivity for political, social and economic development and underline how ICTs help bridge the lack of infrastructure in developing countries, thereby contributing to citizens' empowerment and growth.

The first is  "Measuring the Impact of Broadband on Income" by Ericsson. The second is a study by Vodafone Institute for Society & Communications titled "Mobile Technologies the Digital Fabric of our Lives."   The first study focuses on impact of broadband access and speed on income. It indicates inter alia that for Brazil, China & India(BIC), even a 0.5 Mb broadband connections increases household income by USD 800 per annum. Further, "[i]n  BIC countries, upgrading from 0.5 to 4 Mbps increases income by USD 46 per month." (Access to more sophisticated services " boosts personal productivity and teleworking and telecommuting allow for more flexible work arrangements."

A longer quote (below) from the second study reiterates the importance of mobile phones which continue to predominate in countries like India with very low fixed line penetration.

"In developing countries, mobile phones have changed everyday lives for many people. Often, mobile phones are the only accessible and functioning infrastructure. As a result, it is unsurprising that people have become inventive by using their mobile phones to replace or create other societal and economic institutions thatwere inefficient or sometimes non-existent. M-Pesa, for instance, has enabled millions of Kenyans to transfer money without having to travel. It is the most successful mobile banking service in the world, but by far not the only one: around the globe, more than 150 mobile banking systems have been introduced, mainly in developing countries. A similar pattern was found regarding the impact of mobile phone subscriptions on social development. 

• [M]odels show that more mobile phone subscriptions correlate with more democratic participation, less gender inequality and more time in education. Our results support this evidence on the macro-level across a sample of 202 countries. They show a significant relationship between the number of mobile phone subscriptions and the voice and accountability index, which is taken as a proxy for democratisation. This relationship is more pronounced in developing countries as there is naturally more scope for improvement in relation to political participation. 
• Women and girls are often the most vulnerable members of communities in developing countries. Their access to the outer world is often very limited and they have to cope with numerous hurdles. First and foremost, they have to ensure the health and well-being of their families and changing their traditionally assigned roles is often the only way forward. The connectedness and   communication without intervention by (male) others can facilitate such a change and reduce gender inequality. Our model across 148 countries supports this idea based on macro-economic data. It shows that with increasing mobile phone subscriptions gender inequality decreases. Again, the effect is most visible in developing countries.
• Mobile phones can have two major types of effects on education:the most direct impact is the use of education via SMS texts or mobile applications, which can reach children as well as adults tend to be larger in developing countries. 
•  In practice, mobile phones fill the gap that other poor or non-existent infrastructure in these countries leave wide open. It is therefore not surprising that many innovations related to mobile phones are adopted more quickly in developing countries than in developed countries. 
• Finally, mobile phones are often the first and only way of communication without having to travel under difficult circumstances. 

Simple Solutions

An article titled "Mexico sees its first village cellphone network" on New Europe online caught my attention. It tells us about a village in Mexico where earlier the residents had to trudge to a community phone to make very expensive calls. Community phones are provided by big telecom operators.

However now,

"Using simple radio receivers, a laptop and relatively inexpensive Internet technologies, the people of the village have leapfrogged into the 21st century by setting up what amounts to their own mini-telecom company — one capable of handling 11 cellphone calls at a time at a small fraction of what they used to pay....in just six months, more than 720 residents have signed up to use the new system. Local calls made on off-the-shelf cellphones are free, and phoning relatives in Los Angeles costs just 20 centavos (1.5 cents) a minute. What's more, every subscriber has a distinct mobile number."

I remember a company approaching USOF India for funding a similar solution for inaccessible villages which could not be taken forward.In this case it appears that rather than look for formal funding, the village pooled money and with the help of a not for profit organisation they were able to set up this system.

ICTs for Indian farmers

A 2009 Deloitte Assocham Report on mobile VAS as a means of inclusion speaks about the sheer enormity of the problem of reaching out to a billion plus population to ensure provision of "basic hygiene and sanitation, clean drinking water, basic healthcare, primary education to adequate housing, roads, higher education, banking facilities, disease control, and disease management. Each problem is exacerbated by its sheer magnitude.  (Refer Table 1)."

Thus, India is a country where rural areas in particular are financially excluded. The RBI has officially directed banks to explore ICTs based solutions through the business correspondent model whereby a village can be covered even in the absence of a brick and mortar branch.

Recently, the Mint carried an article about RuPay a card payment network like Visa and masterCard that is revolutionizing how Indian farmers handle money. Through RuPay Kisan (farmer) cards farmers can make electronic payments at lower transaction costs. It is a domestic system launched in 2012 by the National Payment Corporation of India and many banks (national, private, cooperative and rural) provide vards affiliated to it for population in small towns and villages. While RuPay cards are usable at all ATMs, only 25-30% of the point of sale(PoS) machines are compatible and this is being tacked. Nevertheless, such facilities are empowering farmers through ICT enabled financial inclusion.

The Indian USOF  had also initiated a scheme for ICT enabled banking services in rural India on pilot basis in collaboration with BSNL as an adjunct to the Rural Wire Line Scheme. It dis not succeed due to various stakeholder coordination issues but USOF should in my view continue to strive to support such services. 

China's Broadband Boost

My last post described how China Mobile's technology choice and order placements would benefit Indian operators' plans for 4G roll outs.

It is reported that,

"China's cabinet has recently elevated national broadband development as a national strategy and has announced an implementation timeline for its development over the next eight years.  .The plan will also be carried out in three different stages, with fiber optic networks and 3G mobile coverage to be facilitated in 2013, while broadband coverage will be expanded from 2014 to 2015. Broadband network and technology updates will be the key task from 2016 to 2020."

As I mentioned earlier these plans should boost the mobile broadband ecosystem as a whole and benefit the world at large.

Achieving Universal Service and Digital Progress in a Connected World.

If readers have ever wondered about the title of my blog. Here is an answer.

The Mint today carries an article about "Indian telcos' 4G Plans get[ting] an unexpected boost." This article highlights the benefits of China Mobile Ltd's plans to "purchase equipment worth more than $7 billion for a network based on a new technology standard, boosting its popularity, and potentially increasing the availability of phones and network equipment based on the standard and lowering their costs."

So far, Indian operators desiring to roll out pan India 4G services have been constrained by high cost of equipment and handsets. They possess 4G TD LTE spectrum. This is different from US and European operators' 4G LTE-FDD services meaning that much of the international manufacturing is based on the FDD spectrum standard. China's interest and patronage will give the former technology's supply and overall eco-system the required critical mass helping reduce prices and increase range and availability of equipment.

I think that the question stands answered. It is a "connected world" as far as universal access to state of art telecom services goes.

Rapidly Deployable Disaster Resilient Communications-EU's ABSOLUTE Project

The ABSOLUTE project supported by EU's CORDIS programme promises to be capable of "Guaranteeing Communication Coverage In Event Of Disaster"

It is reported that,

ABSOLUTE, which kicked off in October 2012, aims to design and validate a network capable of providing flexible, secure and resilient broadband services. Telecommunication infrastructures play a key role in recovery operations in the aftermath of an emergency. In most cases, however, terrestrial infrastructure cannot guarantee reliable services for citizens and rescue teams, while current public safety networks simply cannot provide sufficient capacity for broadband applications.

This is what ABSOLUTE seeks to address. By using rapidly deployable flexible aerial platforms with embedded 4G EnodeBs (hardware connected to the mobile phone network that communicates directly with mobile handsets), this industry-driven project aims to show that resilient communication networks can be quickly assembled to provide secure and reliable broadband service over areas affected by large-scale unexpected events, such as natural disasters.

Please see previous posts on Disaster Communications and Emergency services including a post about a similar Google project called Loon.

Perhaps the Ministry of Communications & Technology, India could take a leaf out of EU's book to create a programme like CORDIS to support such innovative industry-government collaborations.

Wise Regulation, the Order of the Day

For quite a few days now Indian media is carrying the story about the sand mafia and the actions of an honest civil servant to prevent illegal mining. A though provoking viewpoint  has been presented on this issue in an article titled, "Between rock, sand and a hard place" in the Times of India on August 11, 2013. It states that, "[i]n several areas, Indian rules and regulations make honest business impossible. The only choice is illegal business or no business." The author of this article draws attention to the shortage of sand for a booming construction sector on account of " licensing and environmental bottlenecks." The latter creates an artificial scarcity that allows the mafia to step in and profit.I will leave readers to judge the merits of these arguments for themselves. 

Why am I writing about sand and construction? 

That is because in my view it reflects the same underlying problem that is  hampering economic activity in the country today. In a developing country that  is (let us accept it), still below par as far as institutional and administrative capacities are concerned, regulation has to be realistic, practical, simple yet sufficiently detailed in order to be unambiguous, leaving little room for arbitrariness/misinterpretation. It should be forward looking so as to not require too frequent review, but it should be reviewed when need be based on well laid down criteria. Most of all it should keep consumer welfare at its focus. 

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's Chairperson (TRAI)  has recently commented on the controversial 3G roaming pacts among three large mobile operators in India. According to the Department of Telecommunications, these pacts replicate the characteristics of Mobile Virtual Network Operators' (MVNO) operations, something that is not yet permitted in India. The operators by sharing spectrum and infrastructure were able to provide 3G services to customers even in telecom circles where they had not won spectrum in the 3G auction. 

The TRAI Chief is quoted as having said that, " in a situation where there is no more spectrum available, it ay not be possible to continue with a regime where pacts for intra-circle roaming (ICR) in 3G services are not allowed..............This is a Catch-22 situation. How is it (closing down ICR) a solution?” 

The article on this issue goes on to say that,

According to [Mr] Khullar Indian law treats spectrum as a holy cow for some reason.

“I can understand that you don’t want to cap gains on assigned spectrum which is administratively allocated. But if everyone is buying spectrum on auction, why not permit trade in it? These are issues on which the government should no longer brook any further delay. A decision needs to be taken,” 

Again, I leave it to readers to form opinions. I would just like to highlight that I agree with the TRAI Chief that corrective regulation is the order of the day if consumer welfare and not regulation for regulations sake is our aim.

I also invite readers to go through previous posts on Telecom Regulation and the Market Efficiency Gap to appreciate the importance of effective regulation for growth and equity in telecommunications penetration.

Cheap Smartphones & the Broadband Ecosystem

The Economic Times today carries an article about Government panning sub $100 smartphones to boost broadband penetration. As per TRAI, India has about 15 million broadband subscribers and about 143 million access internet through wireless.Clearly with  negligible wire lines in access, last mile connectivity in India will be wireless and mobile devices are therefore critical to broadband access.

It is reported that a telecom official stated that, 

"A fully-functional smartphone is no longer an object of desire but an instrument of empowerment ," the official said. He added that since smartphone affordability remains the biggest hurdle to broadband penetration in India, the world's second largest mobile phone market, the government is exploring ways to encourage the biggest handset makers to produce sub- $100 advanced smartphones on a large scale that will come pre-loaded with the latest entertainment applications and also support mobile banking, telemedicine, education to even farming applications like e-krishi."

One viewpoint is that affordability of smart phones is a key driver of broadband penetration.

 "This, mainly since the average global price of such devices continued to hover around $130 (Rs 7,800), the main reason why barely 5% of the Indian population has till date upgraded to genuine smartphones despite the country's 70 %-plus telecom penetration levels.."

 In my view affordability of devices is a necessary but not sufficient condition for universalizing broadband access especially for rural India which has negligible broadband penetration. On the supply side, we also need good quality and affordable  connectivity (absent even in urban areas at present) and on the demand side we need locally relevant content in vernacular languages as well universal accessibility to cater to needs of disabled, illiterate and aged populations. As readers may recall, I has commented earlier on news about a probability of USOF India subsidizing mobile devices for rural poor. My views on this subject may also be seen in previous posts on Broadband Ecosystem

Need for Innovative Regulation-Indian Telecom Sector

On the occasion of the Confederation of Indian Industries National Telecom Summit 2013, The Hon'ble Minister of Communications & IT, the Chief of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India and the Telecom Secretary have all highlighted important elements of the way forward to achieve the goals of universal digital inclusion and to boost the health of the flagging telecom sector in India. 

I am focusing more on the issues affecting the Market efficiency Gap in this blog post.

The need to concentrate of local R&D and design capabilities in manufacturing, the need to improve regulatory certainty including issues like M&A and spectrum and unified licensing were highlighted.  

The TRAI chief  stressed  "on  the critical need to use telecom infrastructure for public service in the fields of disaster management, financial inclusion and digital transactions, in the long term." (source: http://www.ciol.com/ciol/news/192836/government-committed-boost-telecom-sector)

Most importantly the telecom secretary stated that, "[i]nnovation in regulation is also important though legacy issues are there,..... there were complex legacy issues involved in order to fix unpredictability and ambiguity in the regulatory regime." (source: http://www.ciol.com/ciol/news/192860/innovation-regulation-farooqui)

In my view, taking stock of past mistakes, resolving legacy issues and creating a simple but  clearly refined regulatory framework for telecommunications can go a long way to rectify past problems and create a conducive environment for growth of Indian Telecommunications. Please see my earlier posts on Telecom Regulation.

Of course the legal framework of the  telecommunications sector is a part of the overall legal/regulatory framework of the economy which too needs looking at. One of these areas lies in the realm of competition policy. An overarching competition policy framework would prevent many a poor policy /programme from being accepted and would strengthen the ability of regulators and policy makers to make economically wiser decisions. I have written about this is an article titled "Airwaves, Incumbents and Good Governance - The Urgent Need for a Robust Competition Policy Framework" Also, please see my previous posts on Competition.

Delhi College (LSR) shows us the way-ICTs for PwDs

ICTs can play a critical role in empowering the disabled. My views on the potential of ICTs to empower Persons with Disabilities (PwDs) are presented in the exhibit  below:

The Potential of ICTs for PwDs (Archana.G.Gulat at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1970714)

 

I am proud to share a news item about my alma mater Lady Shri Ram College planning a resource centre for its disabled students as part of its equal-opportunity centre. It will be called  Swavalamban (self-reliance).

"It is a state-of-the-art facility equipped with latest assistive technology aimed at promoting self-reliance and independence among disabled students. The resource centre is endowed with a braille embosser, screen reading software, lex-cam scanner, book scanner, DAISY recorders as well as 10 computer systems with OCR software in both English and Hindi," said Kanika Khandelwal, the college's media coordinator.The resource centre will be fully functional from the upcoming academic year."LSR has the highest intake of disabled students and we do our utmost to ensure their academic, economic and cultural development," said Khandelwal.Last year, LSR had 12 visually impaired students and the college held computer literacy workshops, personality development seminars and other self-help programmes for their benefit. The equal-opportunity centre, Swavalamban, was initiated in 2007 and primarily supports blind students through training in JAWS and SAFA. Apart from computer skills, this centre also imparts entrepreneurial skills through interactive workshops on chocolate making, art and craft and candle-making.The college also provides scholarships to deserving students and conducts training programmes, workshops and field trips."

Please also read previous posts on this subject. 

Ubiquitous Broadband Demands Innovative Solutions

An EU study has found that "71% of all EU wireless data traffic in 2012 was delivered to smartphones and tablets using Wi-Fi, possibly rising to 78% by 2016" 

and that,

"The combined use of Wi-Fi and other small cell infrastructures (which complement traditional macro cell mobile base stations) can relieve congestion on the 3G/4G networks by providing “backhaul” functionality outside those networks, while minimising costs to both network operators and users. Wider use of these technologies could allow operators to save tens of billions of euros as they go about upgrading networks to meet customer demand. Consumers would save money by using Wi-Fi instead of paying for mobile data when they are actually near a Wi-Fi hotspot. Small cells can also extend network coverage into hard to reach places, including inside large buildings.

The study recommends to make spectrum from 5150 MHz to 5925 MHz available globally for Wi Fi; to continue making the 2.6 GHz and the 3.5 GHz bands fully available for mobile use and to consult on future licensing options for 3.5 GHz and other potential new licensed mobile frequency bands; and to reduce the administrative burden on the deployment of off-load services and networks in public locations."

There are important lessons here for India where scare and expensive 2G/3G spectrum drives up the price of wireless internet/broadband such that it is quite unaffordable for most people. On the other hand, given the low fixed line penetration, the growth in broadband is expected to come largely from wireless access.

Nigeria's Universal Service Provision Fund-Lessons Learnt Way Forward & ITU's GSR 13 Discussion Paper

It has been reported that the Nigerian USPF ("which is a special fund set up by the Federal Government under the Nigerian Communications Act 2003, designed to provide telecommunications and ICT services to un-served, under-served and deprived groups and communities in the country") will under its new five year Strategic Management Plan (SMP),  build 1000 BTS per year and also lay 15,0000 kms of OFC . It will afurther create Internet POPs in 25 clusters by 2017.

The previous SMP which ended in 2011 revealed lessons that are perhaps  common across the globe. These include use of bidding for transparency, the need to "follow an  integrated approach to project strategy and execution would lead to increased participation of industry operators; ensure implementation of well-planned and adaptable projects that suits a variety of ICT schemes.." etc.

The problem with the earlier SMP include that,

“...[P]rojects were designed and defined using a ‘one size fits all’ approach, thus USP intervention, in some cases, did not directly address the specific needs of the beneficiaries, among others challenges,”  as stated by partner KPMG chief said.

I have written about this earlier as for example at http://ictsforall.blogspot.in/2013/07/usof-indias-unspent-balance-under.html.

Many of these thoughts are echoed in ITU's discussion paper on Universal Service Funds for the Global Symposium for Regulators 2013. (Please see  http://ictsforall.blogspot.in/search/label/GSR%202013.) This paper has outlined 12 success factors for effectiveness of USFs including policy and regulation, lexibility, transparency & accountability, active participation & inputs from all stakeholders, comprehensiveness of projects to cover all sustainability elements etc. I will write more about this soon.

USOF India's Unspent Balance under Criticism

In my previous post titled, "Questioning the Efficacy of Universal Service Funds: GSMA Calls for Re-evaluation and Reduction of the Universal Service Fund Levy,"  I had written that funding for Universal Access/ Universal Service is mostly from either the general budget or levies on operators. Given that it imposes a form of taxation and given that it is expected to meet certain legally, politically and ethically important targets, the subject of US in general and US funds (USFs)  in particular is always under scrutiny and debates on this issue range from questioning the need for US regulation in a competitive  market to arguing in favour/against inclusion of broadband  in its purview. Off late the balance seems to be tilting in favour of USF for funding national broadband plans and nation-wide OFC networks.  Thus discussions range from trashing the concept to seeing it as a vehicle for achieving state of art ICT services.

I had mentioned that the April 2013 GSMA Survey and Report available at GSMA Calls for Re-evaluation and Reduction of the Universal Service Fund Levy question the efficacy of USFs as means of  achieving the objectives of US.  As far as India is concerned there is praise for transparency in financial reporting and criticism for " inadequate or misguided articulation of USF objectives and strategy” that have encouraged urban rather than rural roll outs. (Please  also see my post on USOF India.). The findings of the survey including inter alia the large unspent balances point to the need for better institutional mechanisms that guarantee transparency, accountability and competitive neutrality while still being tailored to a country’s local context. Further we need to adopt a more innovative and flexible approach to US funding. We need to consider more bottom-up PPPs, more demand-driven projects and also projects that address demand side gaps to penetration of ICTs.

I have written earlier comparing the flexible bottom up multi-stakeholder approach of Sanchar Shakti programme that succeeded, with the more rigid, operator dependent approach taken in USOF's ICTs for PwDs project that did not. 

Traditionally, USFs have folowed a supply centric, top-down  approach wherein gaps are identified by the USF Administration and then projects are designed and bid out to select the Universal Service Providers (USPs). This approach may however not be flexible enough to meet the needs of various sections of the population and to address different reasons for the access gap.  Hence there is a need to consider a more flexible, consultative, collaboartive and multi-stakeholder approach to designing USOF programmes.

Again, USFs in many developing countries have problems of under-spending whereby funds continue to accumulate as not enough projects are initiated in comparison to collections.  This is partly on account of difficulties in conceiving appropriate projects meet diverse and ever evolving stakeholder requirements.  I believe that USFs set aside a percentage of available funds to be utilised for demand-driven projects emanating from the user community. Broad eligibility criteria could be pre-decided and placed in public domain along with transparent but mainly qualitative evaluation criteria and procedures. This would allow USF Administrations to maintain a shelf of projects that are useful and pertinent to end users. This is especially true for needs that are more application-centric such as projects for marginalised communities that may have a major content and capacity building component. This approach would lend a much needed dynamism to USF activities. It would also help USOF address demand side gaps in telecom penetration as opposed to supporting only supply side initiatives.

An article dated 28.7.2013 titled "Disconnect in India's rural telecom fund; $4.65 bn idling” highlights the unspent balances of USOF and comments of Administrator USOF thereof.It quotes Gabriel Solomon, the public policy head of Groupe Speciale Mobile Association (GSMA), the global association for mobile companies as having said that, 

"One  of the main reasons why such funds remain unused in many countries is that a competitive industry like telecom moves at a pace which these funds cannot keep up with," 

and that

"In a matter of a few years, the mobile industry in India has built huge infrastructure, connecting hundreds of millions of people. Why even consider a USOF (Universal Service Obligation Fund) now? If the private sector is appropriately incentivised it will always outperform the public sector."

As per the same article, the USOF Administrator has clarified as follows

"Out of the Rs.27,949.91 crore left unused, some Rs.20,000 crore will be deployed for the national optic fibre network project and another Rs.3,046 crore for installing 2,199 mobile towers in the nine Left-wing extremism-affected states."

"The criticism is valid for the time being. But we are evolving. As the projects start rolling out, we will need more funds," he said, adding the projects include one to link each of India's 250,000 village councils with high-speed data cables."

USOF India has many good schemes to its credit.(Please see many previous posts USOF India). What is  perhaps needed is a more imaginative, flexible approach and assurance of a level playing field between private and public sector operators.