The Attorney-General and Minister for Communications, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, speaks during the opening of the three-day Pacific Conference on Finance and Investment at the Fiji National University Nasinu campus yesterday. Photo: RAMA
By RANOBA BAOA
The Attorney-General and Minister for Communications, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, has revealed Government will be auctioning the 4G spectrum in the next month or so.
The Minister said this would essentially mean that internet speeds could be increased.
He made this revelation yesterday whilst opening the three-day Pacific Conference on Finance and Investment at the Fiji National University Nasinu campus.
Meanwhile, Mr Sayed-Khaiyum also stressed Government’s commitment to ensuring 100 per cent network coverage in Fiji.
“We have recently advertised in the papers, the identifications of locations in Fiji where there is no network coverage or limited network coverage,” he said.
“So government is now going to subsidise telecommunications companies to go into those areas.
“You may have 20 families living in an area – obviously it’s not investment-friendly for telecommunications companies to put up a $300,000 to $400,000 tower and expect get a return on their investment.
“They obviously need a bit of a boost. So that’s when government comes in and subsidises to ensure that there is network coverage.”
Mr Sayed-Khaiyum said by ensuring you have a 100 per cent coverage of network in Fiji, would also mean access to education.
Linking knowledge
Meanwhile, Fiji National University vice chancellor, Dr Ganesh Chand, highlighted that the interface between the industry and academics is vital to generating new and learned knowledge.
With over 70 papers to be presented during the Pacific Conference on Finance and Investment, Dr Chand said this was an opportune time to link this.
“Often academics have bad tags-in other words they know nothing more than just a text book and the classroom and they know nothing about how the world functions,” he said.
“Both need to be linked in such a way that each benefits from the activities of the other and industry needs to support research and in turn benefit from the outcome of the findings of research.”
It is this interface Dr Chand said hoped would be developed in Fiji over the next few years.
A-G stressed collaboration need
Mr Sayed-Khaiyum agreed with Dr Chand.
“There has not been collaboration between academia and the private sector to the sector to which it should have happened and this is critical,” Mr Sayed-Khaiyum said.
“We need to encourage them and of course they need to see the benefits of ensuring that the participation of the academic in Fiji does have some very practical and tangible effect in the investment sector and in businesses.”