Today, the 16th of November, 2005, during a press conference with international participation held in Tunis, on the occasion of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), the President of the National Regulatory Authority for Communications of Romania (ANRC), has announced that until 2010 ANRC will finance the connection to telephone networks of all rural communities in Romania deprived of access to communications services. On this occasion, the ANRC President has presented the multi-annual programme for the installation of telecentres, as a part of the national strategy for the implementation of the Universal Service in Romania.
ANRC has registered the national telecentres programme with „Partners to Connect the World” – a partnership launched by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) that will create a showcase highlighting the projects realised by the participants to WSIS (governments, NGOs, representatives of the private sector and of the civil society) having the goal to connect all the communities to communications services by 2015. The solution implemented by ANRC to connect the Romanian villages which have no access to telephone networks is original because it is based on a partnership between the Government, communications operators and local administrations. This solution may be useful to other countries that are facing similar access problems.
“In the spirit of the Action Plan adopted in Geneva, in 2003, during the first phase of WSIS, which provides for the connection of all communities to communications services by 2015 and the establishment of public access points, ANRC has undertaken to connect all the Romanian villages still deprived of access to telephone networks by 2010, in order for the citizens living in rural areas to have access to communications services. All the Romanian citizens have the right to use telephone services, to call the ambulance and navigate on the Internet. Our villagers’ children are as bright and hard-working as those in the urban areas, they only need access to information in order to have equal development opportunities in Romania, in Europe and in the entire world”, Mr. Dan Georgescu declared during the press conference.
In September this year, ANRC launched a first public tender for the installation of telecentres in 40 villages in 23 counties of Romania. Until the end of 2005, a further public tender will be launched for another lot of villages. It is estimated that installation of approximately 100 telecentres will be out for tender before the end of 2005 and further tenders will be regularly organized at few months’ intervals, during the next couple of years, so that until the end of 2008 more than 600 villages will benefit from the installation of telecentres. The villages participating in the first tender organized in 2005 have been selected from the list of the 348 villages whose administrations have expressed their availability to entirely cover the expenses related to the management of telecentres.
Deployment of telecentres is intended to establish infrastructure “bridgeheads” in the areas with extremely low coverage or with no coverage at all and, therefore, to stimulate future market supply, facilitating natural rollout of telephone networks. At the same time, deployment of telecentres helps educating consumers to use the electronic communications services, which would consequently increase future market demand in the rural areas.
„The operators will find it easier to install individual lines in the villages where they have a point of presence and where people got used to have access, at the telecentres, to telephone and Internet services. Together, ANRC, the local administrations and the operators will connect all the Romanian communities that do not have access to communications services at present” , Dan Georgescu also declared.
In the very small villages, where telecentres would not be efficient, ANRC is considering the installation of public pay telephones, based on the same principle of partnership with the communications operators and local administrations.
Additional Information
The telecentre is a public area (a room) endowed with at least 2 telephone sets, 2 computers and one fax machine. The two operational computers in these telecentres offer the community, especially the youngsters, equal opportunities with the citizens who regularly use a computer as concerns education and the potential of exploiting new technologies.
The national programme for the installation of telecentres is part of the strategy for the implementation of Universal Service in Romania, for the purpose of ensuring the access of all citizens to communications services.
The tender process for the installation of telecentres, tested in 2004 through a pilot-project by which Orange Romania was designated as universal service provider and installed the first 5 telecentres, has been reviewed this year in order to increase the attractiveness of telecentres for the electronic communications providers and to limit the business risk in the rural area. Thus, the obligations of the universal service providers have been limited to the activities related strictly to the provision of electronic communications networks and services. The designated Universal Service providers will provide the access connection, will procure, install and insure the equipments within the telecentre, while training the personnel that is to maintain and supervise the operation of the installed hardware and software.
Deciding to involve in the telecentre management process, local administrations committed themselves to make available the space required for the telecentre installation, including utilities, security and maintenance. The local administrations will ensure the operation and maintenance of the telecentre equipments, the provision of telephone and Internet access services to end-users, as well as the billing process.
The tender is an effective method to objectively establish the necessary amount for the installation of each telecentre. This amount is to be reimbursed, upon request, to the universal service provider, after the installation and commissioning of the telecentre, according to the compensation mechanism established by ANRC.
The designated universal service providers have the obligation to install the telecentres within 120 days after the local administration makes available the telecentre location. The mayoralties will make available this location to the operators within 30 days since the end of the tender.
The telecentre will operate for at least three years. After this period, if the project has proved to be useful for the community, the mayoralty may continue to run the telecentre, given the fact that the equipments and terminals made available by the universal service provider will become property of the mayoralty.