Billionaire Elon Musk activated a few weeks ago in Ukraine ‘Starlink’, a satellite internet service, after receiving a request in this regard from the Ukrainian government, which is facing a Russian military offensive. This to guarantee connectivity and communications in an area affected by a military conflict.
The ‘Starlink’ project was born years ago precisely to try to cover this need and provide access to communications from any site that “has a view of the sky”. Elon Musk’s satellite internet project plans to reach several Latin American countries in the not too distant future.
SpaceX, Musk’s aerospace company, has already registered Starlink subsidiaries in Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Colombia.
According to the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), 32% of the region; that is, some 244 million people do not access internet services. Of a total of 24 countries, 71% of the urban population has connectivity options, compared to less than 37% in rural areas.
For its part, for Ecuador, connecting rural areas to the Internet is a priority on government and telecommunications agendas. And it is not for less, since it is about including more than 6.32 million people, 35% of the total Ecuadorian population (17.6 million), according to World Bank figures.
And it is that Starlink is a satellite project that seeks to create a global network of high-speed broadband internet to places where access has been difficult, expensive or totally absent. It currently has a constellation of 1000 units. However, there are already satellite internet options on the market that seek the same purpose.
In the country, about 50% of homes have fixed internet; Of them, only 18.4% with fixed internet access are in rural areas; and, only 35% of households in rural conditions have internet access, mainly served by small operators or informal operators. In addition, the digital gap measured by the comparison of internet access between rural versus urban households reaches almost 19 percentage points of difference.
The study “Connectivity in Ecuador and satellite internet as a tool to close the digital gap” by HughesNet Ecuador and the Equifax Group of Companies showed a marked penetration of fixed internet operators in the areas of the Ecuadorian Coast. This means that the incursion of operators is low in provinces such as Loja and Bolívar and minimal in those close to the Amazon, such as Morona Santiago.
In addition, fixed internet speeds vary significantly between urban parishes in contrast to rural ones, where the availability and speed of the service is up to 20% lower. Urban areas reach speeds above 20Mbps, while rural areas reach 5Mbps.
Although the study focuses its analysis on the fixed internet, there are relevant data to complement the analysis of the urban-rural digital divide. For example, of the nearly 14 million mobile phone users, the vast majority, 84%, are located in urban areas. In addition, while urban areas reach a range of 25 Mbps, rural areas do not even reach 10 Mbps. In fact, speeds are so uneven in the country that areas near the Amazon do not exceed 5 Mbps, this is the case of Pastaza and Orellana with 2 Mbps.
One of the findings that allow us to establish the digital and connectivity gaps that still exist in Ecuador is related to the comparison between provinces. Thus, this report establishes that only four provinces (Imbabura, Pichincha, Guayas and Azuay) have a fixed internet coverage rate of over 50%.
For this reason, companies like HughesNet offer coverage in Ecuador that allows you to fulfill this task. Currently, it has more than 255 thousand square kilometers of coverage, and more than 5,000 connected rural homes in the country.
In order to close this digital gap, all social actors must be included according to this study. The first step is to know the current situation of the provinces and parishes to respond to the needs of the population. In this sense, the task should be concentrated in those areas with low or no coverage of fixed and mobile internet, thus guaranteeing the greatest probability of success in closing the digital divide.
For Carolina Bohórquez, Marketing Manager of HughesNet Ecuador, this connectivity study is one of the most complete in recent years, and describes the work carried out by HughesNet’s satellite internet as laudable, “In addition to marketing a service that represents a window to the World, and access to opportunities such as the internet, we are reaching all those provinces, and distant, neglected parishes, we are connecting the unconnected”
Meanwhile, for Juan Martínez, leader of the geographic solutions team of the Equifax group of companies for Latin America and one of the authors of this study, territorial analyzes with an emphasis on the particularities of each country, province and even parish are essential to contribute to the purposes of shortening the digital gaps in the region. “When carrying out this analysis we have observed that, although the common denominator in Latin America is that of lower access and speed in rural areas, the potentialities are also different in each country, so a connectivity strategy must consider multiple variables so that be effective”. (I)
Source: Eluniverso
Paul is a talented author and journalist with a passion for entertainment and general news. He currently works as a writer at the 247 News Agency, where he has established herself as a respected voice in the industry.
