SWITCHOVER TO DIGITAL URGENT –SAYS PM GOLDING

SWITCHOVER TO DIGITAL URGENT -SAYS PM GOLDING

Prime Minister Bruce Golding said that Jamaica needs to accelerate the national switchover to a digital telecommunications system as it can be a boost to education and investment. A digital switchover will make more frequencies available for more telecoms licensees.

The Prime Minister was speaking on February 18 at the official opening of the Spectrum Management Authority's (SMA) office on Harbour Street, Downtown Kingston.

Mr. Golding said, "We need to move urgently to do the switchover to a digital system. We established a national steering committee chaired by Minister Vaz with a number of stakeholders from the private sector to work through all the issues that has to be dealt with...The implications are that Jamaica will enjoy significant expansion of telecommunication capabilities."

Special mention of the impact on education was made by the Prime Minister, "Our children display no inertia to technology and IT provides us with an opportunity to make the whole process of education more friendly. It has tremendous potential for institutional learning and for improving businesses....we are looking at a whole horizon of opportunities that would not have existed before. It is a tool of transformation," he said.