A VICE chairman of the House Committee on Appropriations last Sunday urged Malacañang to speed up the implementation of a National Broadband Network (NBN) to keep the country’s Internet connectivity and access on pace with global technological advancements.
Nacionalista Party Rep. Luis Raymund Villafuerte of Camarines Sur, in a statement, said the government’s ambitious infrastructure program should not only involve building physical structures but also closing the country’s digital divide.
He added seamless, fast access to the Internet would provide Filipinos with more opportunities to increase their incomes and broaden their access to education, communications, health-care information and electronic commerce, to mention a few advantages.
Aside from putting up a third player to toughen competition among Internet providers to improve their broadband services, Villafuerte said the government should also streamline the approval of permits secured by telecommunication companies in various levels of the bureaucracy and attract overseas investments by fast-tracking efforts to relax the 60-40 ownership rule of companies in the 1987 Constitution.
“For the government to attain economic inclusion for all sectors, it needs to invest soon enough in expanding wireless connectivity so as not to leave behind millions of Filipinos from the information technology that now drives the global economy,” Villafuerte added.
“Filling our infrastructure backlog should be complemented by dramatic advances in digital-technology access to remote, impoverished communities, so that people in the countryside can take advantage of the Internet in exploring and expanding economic opportunities available to them,” he said.
Last March President Duterte approved the draft National Broadband Plan of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), whose program involves providing at least 10 Mbps connection to all households by 2020.
Villafuerte added the government’s “north-to-south” broadband plan would cost about P77.9 billion, as stated in the DICT’s draft NBN blueprint.
The lawmaker said members of the Asean have already started establishing their respective NBNs.
In Thailand Villafuerte said the government has invested $114 million to improve its Internet service and access, and Malaysia has spent $4.5 billion over a 10-year period to lay fiber-optic lines to service every home in the country’s urban areas.
He said the government is the largest investor in telecommunications in Vietnam. Two of the three largest telecom companies in Ho Chi Minh City are owned by the government.
To strengthen the NBN as a knowledge tool for the poor, Villafuerte urged the leadership of Congress to approve the bill aimed to institutionalize the use of digital technology in the public-education system.
Villafuerte’s House Bill 264 calls for the formulation of a digital-technology road map for public schools, with the following goals: maximizing the use of the Internet and other digital technologies as learning aids; and providing sufficient training for teachers and students on the use of digital technology in public education.
It also provides for the professional development of educators on the effective use of digital technology inside the classroom, establishing a system of upgrading and replacing outdated technology in public schools and providing technical support to maintain the systems.