SA is set to turn on digital television next April; however, the Department of Communications is silent on several vital aspects that must be wrapped up as the year-end break rapidly approaches.
Digital television was one of former communications minister Roy Padayachie's priorities during his short tenure. However, several key dates have been pushed out, and SA is now set to launch digital broadcasting in September, and not in April as initially intended.
Until key issues such as standards and set-top box controls are sorted out, manufacturers cannot make set-top boxes. The decoders are vital for about 10 million households to continue receiving signal when the country turns off the old analogue broadcast at the end of 2013.
Altech UEC MD Rodger Warren explains that it will take nine months from when outstanding issues are sorted out to get decoders onto retailers' shelves. He says the most important aspect is the standard, which has yet to be released.
Warren says the standard was set to be issued in September, but this date was moved to October, then November, and is now only likely to happen next month. However, UEC will close down for the traditional break from mid-December.
Clouding the standards issue is the ongoing debate about set-top box controls. The encryption tool, intended to stop local boxes from being illicitly shipped across SA's borders, was meant to be dealt with by broadcasters.
In September, the communications department weighed in and said it wanted to handle the issue, arguing that leaving controls up to incumbent broadcasters could cut new entrants out of the picture. This issue has yet to be resolved and is holding up the promulgation of standards, explains Warren.
Warren says there has been much work in the background, but manufacturers are not being kept in the loop and there is no active engagement with the industry. Digital migration was meant to act as a catalyst to spur on SA's flagging manufacturing sector and aid emerging companies.
Manufacturers need finality within the next few weeks, otherwise meeting the September turn on date will be challenging, notes Warren. He says digital migration has gone “very quiet”.
Altech will be as ready as it can be, given the lack of final specifications, adds Warren.
Lagging behind
SA also does not have digital television regulations, after the Independent Communications Authority of SA (ICASA) repealed the previous stipulations last month. The regulations have been replaced with a draft document, which was open to public comment until 10 November.
The authority explained that SA's decision to migrate using DVB-T2, and not its forerunner, means that spectrum will be more efficiently used and it is necessary to “assess the implications of this increase on the allocation of capacity”.
Spokesman Paseka Maleka says ICASA is reviewing the written submissions and will hold public hearings in early December. “However, we cannot say for sure when the regulations will be finalised, because we are awaiting the finalisation of the broadcasting digital migration policy by the Department of Communications.”
The authority's target is the end of the year and there is still time to meet the April deadline, adds Maleka.
Yet, according to Treasury's mid-term estimates of national expenditure, none of SA's population had been covered with the DVB-T2 signal by the end of September.
After Padayachie announced in January that SA would migrate using DVB-T2, Sentech has needed to refit its transmitters. The target is 80% population coverage by the end of March next year, just before the “soft” launch.
Spokesperson Nthabeleng Mokitimi says the state signal provider had covered 60% of the population with DVB-T, which was endorsed by Cabinet in 2006, before the more efficient DVB-T2 was decided upon.
Mokitimi says these sites are being converted to DVB-T2 and this process will be wrapped up by the end of next March “to provide a fully operational DTT network in support of the official launch in the country”.
A trial network is running, covering a third of SA's population, in Johannesburg, Durban and Pretoria. “Sentech is on track to ensure that affected broadcasters migrate from analogue to digital television within the government set timelines,” notes Mokitimi.
Sentech has already spent R500 million on gearing up, and will spend another R900 million, says Mokitimi.
ITWeb has unsuccessfully attempted to gain clarity on the issue from the communications department for more than a week.
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