The World Bank and its private sector affiliate, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) is among the eight development finance institutions (DFIs) which have agreed to jointly finance the proposed underwater telephony system for Africa aimed at bringing down the cost of telecommunications on the continent.

In a statement, IFC said following extensive dialogue and negotiations on the East African Submarine Cable System (EASSy) and its general structure including the roles of the respective stakeholder groups, it would now mobilize reputable international organizations to provide technical assistance.

"The project structure has been agreed upon by governments, NEPAD e-Africa Commission, telecommunications operators and the Development Financial Institutions represented at the Nairobi meetings by the African Development Bank, the European Investment Bank," IFC noted in a statement received in Nairobi Thursday.

The French Development Bank , its allies PROPARCO, the Development Bank of Southern Africa, KfW Entwicklungsbank, the World Bank and the International Finance Corporation have jointly agreed to offer the financing part of the project.

Technical assistance is also being provided by the Department for International Development , the European Union, the Information for Development Program, the Public Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency.

The consensus was reached during an all-stakeholders meeting on July 4-6, 2006 hosted by the government of Kenya in Nairobi

Laying of the undersea cable from South Africa to Djibouti is set to begin next month. A French telecommunication company, Alcatel, has won the construction and maintenance tender for the project.

A joint task force with representatives from each of these key stakeholder groups was also created to maintain continuous dialogue and channel governments' policy objectives into the Construction and Maintenance Agreement and the Shareholders' Agreement.

EASSy is an initiative to connect over twenty coastal and land- locked countries in East and Southern Africa.

The countries are: Burundi, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Rwanda, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Via a high bandwidth, undersea fiber optic cable system and terrestrial backhaul links to the rest of the world.

The African countries agreed to access to cheaper telecommunication by March 2008 after the 29 private and state-run entities involved in the project planning agreed to jointly undertake the regional underwater cable linking the entire continent.

The shareholders of the EASSy, which unites state-run telecommunication entities and private data companies operating in the Indian Ocean states, Southern Africa and Eastern Africa have completed rollout plans for the project.

Kenya is among the 13 Eastern and Southern Africa countries, including Ethiopia, Rwanda, Madagascar, Sudan, Zambia, Uganda, South Africa, and Burundi among others who were represented a three-day meeting to plan for the implementation of the project.

The officials from the 29 members of the EASSy project, among them 12 state-run telecom firms and telecom regulators and 17 semi- private investors, mostly a hybrid of foreign and state-owned firms operating mobile phone services, agreed on the financing.

The 29 stakeholders would jointly fund the project after they complete an open access and commercial arrangements, ownership structure as well as other issues, which the shareholders classify as "public interest" like landing stations and other financing gaps.

Experts estimate the project would cost 300 million U.S. dollars to implement but finer details regarding various technical issues on the project were the main agenda of the Nairobi meeting. They also discussed the commercialization arrangements

Kenyan officials have been concerned about the delays in contracting for the project and recently moved a step further to advertise for private gateway providers to help in the construction of the sub-marine cable linking Kenya to the United Arab Emirates.

According to Kenyan telecommunication planners, the lack of a sub-marine cable is to blame for the very high cost of telecommunication that Africa has to contend with.

It costs 1,000 dollars to rent a gigabyte of data every month in Africa while it costs about 20 dollars to rent the same capacity in the developed nations like the U.S. and Britain.

Meanwhile, the aim of the EASSy project is to increase accessibility to information and communication technologies by significantly reducing the current prohibitive cost of telephony and Internet connectivity.

IFC says the project would boost regional competitiveness and enable Africa to participate more actively in the global economy.

"Recognizing the strong linkages between connectivity and economic development, the DFIs jointly reaffirm their commitment to support this public-private partnership," says IFC. "The DFIs believe it is realistic to achieve affordable and competitively priced telecommunications services."

The stakeholders meeting successfully reached its main objective of arriving at a consensus around a hybrid project structure that meets the governments developmental objectives of ensuring low-cost open access to international connectivity, while providing for financing flexibility.

Source: Xinhua