Okoh Aihe
11 June 2008
column
There is frenzy around the world about migration to digital broadcasting. Continents and countries are picking date for the single most expensive switchover that will see the death of anologue broadcasting and witness the birth of a new genre.
Odey
The exercise will allow maximum use of broadcast spectrum, introduce great picture and sound quality, and permit just any broadcast activity to take place on a single platform.
The world ever unable to wait for a breakthrough is very anxious. America is going digital by February next year. South Africa has picked 2010 to coincide with their hosting of the world cup. Nigeria is switching over by 2012, the same time with the rest of Africa and Europe.
But that's where the simplicity ends. Reactions and preparations from country to country are different. The exercise is expensive, very expensive and it will affect the mass of the people all over the world in terms of cost and ability to receive TV and radio signals.
In the United States, the government is giving out two vouchers for set top boxes to each family to help mitigate the cost. This is because by next when their switch over takes place, most of the TV sets will still be analogue although production and importation of analogue TV sets have since stopped. The set top boxes will help convert analogue signals to digital signals.
Most countries around the world are thinking of what to do. The Nigerian cut over began in 2007 when President Umaru Yar'Adua approved of the digitalisation process, prompting the regulator, the Nigerian Broadcasting Commission, NBC, to flag off the process with the Cable TV operators completing their switch over by May 30, 2008. However, the expectation by the International Telecommunications Union, ITU, rising from the Regional Radiocommunications Conference, RRC 06, in 2006, is that by 2015 all UHF channels would have gone digital while the VHF is set for 2020.
But without waiting for the ITU deadline, the Nigerian government gave the 2012 window and this unfortunately with its all its laudability, was only on paper. The first major sign of preparations came last week when the NBC on behalf of the Nigerian government called a conference with theme, Digitalisation and its Implications at the Sheraton Hotel and Towers, Abuja.
In a very terse but challenging one-page statement, the Minister of Information and Communications, Mr. John Ogar Odey noted that the "government fully appreciates that Nigeria cannot afford to be left behind in view of the drastic consequences on our broadcast industry and the overall information sector. That is the rational for this stakeholders meeting."
"Your tasks, ladies and gentlemen, are to deliberate on implications of digitalisation and provide government with framework for policy formulation and execution on digitalisation," he said.
The framework is not going to come easy because paper after paper only demonstrated how Herculean the task is and the kind of cost that is likely to arise.
And there is no doubt whether the switchover will come, listening to the words of Engr Yomi Bolarinwa, DG, NBC. "I am pleased to inform you that as of today, all the MMDS operators in this country have gone digital. Now it is the turn of the terrestrial broadcasters whose transition will have a more profound effect on the sector and on the public. And that is why we are here to decide how to go about it together," he said.
Plus our own Nigerian experts, led by Engr. Vincent Maduka, who delivered the lead paper, Engr. Yomi Bolarinwa of the NBC, Alhaji Abubakar Jijiwa of BON, Engr Amana of NTA, and Engr Steven Bello of the NCC, a number of resource persons came from other parts of the continent and Europe.
Engr Shola Taylor of Kemilinks International came from the UK; Mr. Calvo Mawela of Orbicom came from South Africa, while Mr. Daniel Obam, Chairman, Digital Migration Committee, came from Kenya.
While the visitors shared their experience in the digitalisation exercise, all speakers including the Nigerians succeeded in bringing attention to the technical and financial challenges of the exercise and encouraged government to take bold steps that could help mitigate costs for Nigerians. But where was the money going to come from?
For instance, Engr Taylor opined that the NTA with its numerous stations will be most hit by the exercise and suggested that government should be ready to fund the digitalisation process of the self acclaimed biggest television network in Africa. But some somebody seated close by quickly interjected, who will now fund the private operators? If the broadcast sector is indeed deregulated, the question deserves an answer. Taylor also suggested a kind of fund that will assist those in the low income group for the switch over.
But looking at the kind of deep belly of digital technology, Taylor suggested a breakdown of NTA into two entities - Content and Hardcore Broadcasting. The reason for this suggestion and this is part of the huge cost that people saw at the conference, is that content will become a major issue.
The explanation is not farfetched. If a station was running just one channel on its analogue channel that same channel could easily take six channels when it goes digital, and all the six channels will need various levels of contents to fill.
The Kenyan government has accepted the inevitability of the switchover and is allocating a digital channel to each analogue channel, according to Obam.
The government he explained is also thinking of how to positively affect the 3million TVs in Kenya before the analogue door is finally shut by 2012. The committee which he is heading is expected to work on a national migration policy which will take into consideration the position of government, the broadcasters and the audience who would be most hit. The committee will also be expected to find a place for the new businesses the process will throw up.
South Africa has also set up a digital migration committee which is working on their switch on from November this year with total analogue switch off expected in 2011. The committee has a wide representation drawn from policy makers, regulator, SABC, community and commercial licensees, signal distributors, civil society and organized labour.
Participants encouraged the government to set up a committee that will throttle up immediately. The switch over is real. Australia is billed for 2013, Canada 2011, China 2015, Hong Kong 2012, Japan 2011, Malaysia 2015, Taiwan 2010, Europe 2012 and USA 2009.
Any country is left behind in this digital frenzy is shutting itself out of the global village. This is why Nigerians are expecting the government to expedite action on the digitalisation process and properly fund it to ensure results are achieved.
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