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From: "Anna Secka Saine" <asaine@qanet.gm> To: 'Ma. Dolores Lizarzaburu' <mlizarza@uoregon.edu> Cc: "'Steve Huter'" <sghuter@nsrc.org> Time: Wed, 16 Aug 2006 16:12:16 +0100 Subject: RE: Internet Update - The Gambia Hi Dolores, Below are the answers to your questions: >1) TOTAL INTERNATIONAL BANDWIDTH & TOTAL ESTIMATED NUMBER OF USERS IN THE GAMBIA: The total estimated external bandwidth at this time is 46Mbps and the number of users is estimated to be between 10,000 and 15,000. Please note that this bandwidth excludes institutions that are allowed to have VSATs for non-commercial purposes. >2)ISPs AND UNIVERSITIES/RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS WITH EXTERNAL CONNECTIVITY CURRENTLY >OPERATING IN THE GAMBIA: ISP/UNV Link Type Bandwidth Upstream ISP POP Location(s) ============= ============== ========= ================ =============== Airtip VSAT Unknown Unknown Serekunda Netpage leased circuit 512K Gamtel Serekunda QuantumNET leased circuit 1.5M Gamtel Serekunda,Banjul Gamtel fibre/VSAT 42M Sonatel/Teleglobe Abuko MRC VSAT 2M BT/Teleglobe Bakau Uni.of Gambia leased circuit 128K Gamtel Serekunda Uni.of Gambia wireless con. 256K QuantumNET Serekunda GTTI leased circuit 128K Gamtel Serekunda >URLs and contact information: AIRTIP: www.airtip.gm (Contact Mr. Anderson) NETPAGE: www.netpage.gm (Contact Simon Abraham) QUANTUMNET: www.qanet.gm (Contact Mr. Jah) GAMTEL: www.gamtel.gm (Contact Ebrima Bandeh) MRC: www.mrc.ac.uk (Contact David Costell) UNIVERSITY OF GAMBIA: www.unigambia.gm (Contact Dr. Johnson) GTTI: No website (Contact N/A) Please note that with the exception of Airtip, who currently has a VSAT license for commercial use, all other ISPs are required to connect via Gamtel. The government has recently started issuing VSAT licenses for non-commercial purposes for certain organizations like WHO, UNDP and certain banks. Link types and bandwidth information of these organisations are currently unavailable and are at times deemed confidential. >3) INFORMATION ABOUT ACADEMIC NETWORK DEVELOPMENT IN THE GAMBIA: There are currently no academic networks in the Gambia. Each institution maintains its own networks. The University of the Gambia IT infrastructure is still underdeveloped, even though it offers courses at different locations including Gambia College and GTTI. It only offers distance learning courses via a 256K wireless connection provided by QuantumNET at its main campus. The university has yet to develop a functional IT program which might be part of the reason for the current state of its IT infrastructure. The university currently has a couple of computer labs with internal LANs and internet connection that are available to students. The same can be said for both GTTI and Gambia College. >4)PROSPECTS FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATIONAL AND ACADEMIC NETWORKS IN THE GAMBIA. At a national level, getting rid of the existing monopoly, Gamtel, will enable the private sector to invest more in the development of IT in the country. The Government has recently established a regulatory authority, PURA (Public Utilities Regulatory Authority), to look into ways of getting rid of existing monopolies as well as introduce effective policies to regulate the industry. Once this is done, I believe giant strides will be in the IT sector due to fair competition. At present, the IT sector is not doing too badly since ISPs offer most of the Internet connections/services that are available in US, including fixed and roaming wireless internet connections, ADSL and dialup. The only difference is that these services are offered at a much higher cost. The establishment of an Internet Exchange Point will also help in bringing down the cost of internet connections. At present, Gamtel acts as an exchange point since all the data from the ISPs must pass through its network. The problem is that ISPs are paying the same amount of money for both local and international data. The development of academic networks seems to be pretty dormant at present due to the lack of IT programs at university level. This is primarily due to the lack of funds required to establish these programs as well as maintain them. At present, the government has started introducing basic IT courses at high school level so this might help since academic networks might need to be developed in a few years when the demand coming from high school graduates entering university will be high. Funding as well as human resources from external sources or non-profit organizations will really help in boosting this sector. Cheers, Anna Secka Saine <asaine@qanet.gm>
