Countries in the Southern African Development Community, which includes SA, have opted to migrate to digital television using the upgrade to the European DVB-T standard.
The decision to use DVB-T2 was announced after a meeting between communications ministers in the region this week.
However, while the official choice is DVB-T2, countries within the region are also allowed to implement any other standard, as long as it complies with stipulations included in a 2006 agreement signed in Geneva (GE06) under the auspices of the International Telecommunications Union.
The standard was announced yesterday by Joel Kaapanda, minister of communications and information technology for Namibia and chairman of the SADC committee of ministers responsible for ICT, after the meeting held in Zambia.
The Geneva GE06 agreement sets out the technical standards for digital television infrastructure and broadcast consumer equipment such as televisions and decoders, and each member SADC state, including SA, signed the agreement.
During the meeting, ministers affirmed the region will migrate to digital TV by the end of 2013, ahead of the international deadline of mid-2015. Several countries in the region, such as Namibia and Mauritius, have already started migrating using the European DVB-T standard.
However, SA's own migration, rolling out DVB-T, stalled earlier this year after the country decided to investigate the use of the Brazilian ISDB-T standard. SA's decision to relook its 2006 Cabinet statement angered the industry, which had already spent about R700 million gearing up for migration.
Member states that have already started implementing DVB-T should proceed with its implementation but ultimately migrate to DVB-T2, says Kaapanda.
SA is expected to make its announcement regarding the standard in the next few weeks.
ITWeb will provide further analysis of the SADC decision tomorrow.
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