Rwanda: Rwanda Extends Deadline for Digital TV Migration to July 31
17 January 2014 , By Dias Nyesiga, Source: Focus
The Rwanda Utilities Regulatory Authority (RURA) has set July 31 as
deadline to officially switch off analogue TV transmission and migrate
entirely to digital, citing delays by suppliers who did not bring in
the digital converters on time.
Regis Gatarayiha, RURA's director general, says that the scarcity of
digital television converters, or set top boxes (STBs), has prompted
the body to push to deadline back to July, when suppliers have
positively shown they can ship in the converters.
"With the commitment shown by the authorized vendors of STBs with
regard to importation and shipping, we have decided to permanently
switch over to digital broadcasting by the end of July," he said.
The regulator is planning to migrate in phases for the next few
months, with Kigali's analogue transmission to be switched off on
January 31 followed by other provinces.
The switch means that all people who are currently viewing television
via analogue transmission will need digital converters, or STBs,
connected to their TV sets to be able to view television programs.
"So anyone who will be having these converters will be able to view
our programs as well as other free channels with clear digital
pictures," said Innocent Nkurunziza, head of the Technical Unit of
Rwanda Broadcasting Agency (RBA).
RBA started transmitting its content both in analogue and digital as a
trial phase last year, which officials say has been successful. "We
have been broadcasting both in analogue and digital since last year
and we have found it a success, so we are hopeful that the migration
will go smoothly," Nkurunziza added.
Experts say that the pace at which the country will move to achieve
the new target of July 31 will now depend on the suppliers managing to
bring in enough digital converters. "It is good that the business
sector is determining the pace. Since it is driven by profits, they
have to put in a lot of efforts to ship more converters," Davis
Mukiza, a business consultant, told The Rwanda Focus.
The country needs around 80,000 STBs to make the switch to digital,
while suppliers have so far shipped only 21,000 decoders into the
country.
The National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda estimates there are
144,192 households that own a television set, with most using analogue
and accessing TV Rwanda content, while others pay for digital
connections to subscribe to Star Times, DSTV and Canal Sat.
Expensive
So far, authorized distributors such as Trans-African Container
Transport Ltd has imported 5,000 digital converters, TV 10 has sold
6,500 decoders, with other distributors such as Star Times and Sorim
Ltd also registering increasing decoders sales ahead of the deadline.
Nevertheless, viewers say that the decoders are expensive for ordinary
people. Trans-African Container Transport Ltd sells a decoder at Frw
32,000, Sorim at Frw 28,500, and Star Times at Frw 23,500.
"Distributors are selling decoders at a high price which makes it
difficult to afford them and yet the deadline is near," complained
John Mugabo, a resident of Kigali.
But Kim Kizito, marketing manager at TV10, said that the prices are
likely to go down as demand increases, adding that the current prices
will not affect the rollout of the decoders to meet the deadline.
"We have put our decoders at the lowest price possible, but we expect
this to go down in time to come," said Juma Jafar Bagonza, the
business development director at Trans-African Container Transport
Ltd.
Jean Baptiste Mutabazi, the head of communication and media at RURA,
says that switching to digital will help viewers who have been using
analogue to access more free channels and better quality images.
"Viewers with STBs will be able to access free-to-air channels
broadcast by Rwanda Broadcasting Agency," he said, adding that this
will allow more investors already licensed by the regulator to air
their content.
RURA has so far licensed eight new television stations, which include
TV10, Capital TV, Light House TV, Rwanda Holdings, Contact TV, Lemigo
TV, Max TV and Super TV which are expected to start operations fully
as soon as the migration is completed.
--
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