Dr. Bonnie Peng, Chairperson of the National Communications Commission (NCC) attended the Global Forum 2009 on Oct 19 in Romania and gave a speech entitled “Bridging the Digital Divide in Rural Taiwan”. Dr. Peng also described the vision of “Intelligent Taiwan” which is one of President Ma’s “i-Taiwan 12 Infrastructure projects” and the achievements of narrowing the digital divide in rural Taiwan after the promotion of “broadband for villages” and “broadband for tribes” projects of NCC.

Dr. Peng explained that the “Intelligent Taiwan” included caring for underprivileged groups, and creating fair opportunities for accessing communications, in particular the broadband network. Despite fierce competition from cross-media platforms, companies have been expanding their businesses and creating new markets. Technology continues to develop at a tremendous pace. However, people in remote counties are often denied of fair and reasonable access to communications because they are economically challenged or suffer from lack of resources. This is a concern for the overall development of Taiwan in the future, and is an issue that the competent authority should not ignore.

She further expressed that Taiwan government has to pay attention to both economic benefits and the rights of people when correctly determining the most effective response to the trend of digital convergence. In addition to ushering in new thinking to revolutionize existing legal regulations, NCC has been coordinating closely with private telecommunication service providers in the active promotion of universal service projects, such as “broadband for villages” and “broadband for tribes,” to narrow the divide between urban and rural areas. The achievement has been highly regarded across all sectors.

To illustrate, in 2007, NCC appointed several service providers to establish broadband network at 46 remote villages. The total budget for the project was USD2.76 million, with 145.816km of optical fiber cables being laid capable of transmitting as high as 2Mbps. Broadband now reaches 100% of these remote villages. In 2008, 50 tribes were selected for broadband installation. A total of USD2.22 million was invested with an additional 122.131km of optic fiber cables capable of transmitting as high as 2Mbps. This year, NCC continues to promote its universal broadband service policy, and plans to invest a further 2.35 million USD for installation of 130.015km of optic fiber cables in 51 tribes and villages. Also, since optic fiber cables in southern Taiwan were severely damaged by typhoon Morakot, NCC has required service providers to restore the damaged cables as soon as possible, and ensure that all the people in remote areas are able to enjoy the same broadband communication services as those in urban areas.

Dr. Peng mentioned that Taiwan has a competitive superiority in high-tech industry, and that NCC anticipates that the sophisticated network and universal broadband services can successfully facilitate the bridging of the digital divide, help balance regional development, and improve Taiwan’s overall competitiveness. Furthermore, Dr. Peng stressed that people in several remote areas are underprivileged. Making prices of internet access affordable to these people after the broadband universal service is now one of the challenges that NCC has to address.

In addition to NCC working hard to assist service providers establish broadband networks, the Ministry of Education is establishing digital opportunity centers (DOC) at 168 remote areas over Taiwan, introducing civilian resources and providing consultation to school children and citizens to improve awareness of information application service and connection to community networks. At the same time, the Council of Indigenous Peoples and other agencies are promoting the “shared satellite dish” project by helping people in remote areas install satellite reception equipment. The idea is to improve TV signal reception for indigenous families with satellite broadcasting. This not only helps improve the access of the general public to media, but also narrows the digital divide.

Held by Foundation Sophia Antipolos and Items International of France, the 2009 Global Forum is an annual international information and communications meeting. The information and communication institutes and representatives from related industries were invited to discuss the influences of information and communication technology to human society, as well as exchange information of technical development trends and related policies.