ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 1 ACP Dany Vandromme & George McLaughlin

ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study

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ACP

Dany Vandromme &George McLaughlin


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Specific Objective of the Assessment Study

to examine the relevance and viability of establishing or enhancing National Research and Education Networks (NRENs) in the Pacific Region

and/or the implementation of a Regional Research and Education Network (RREN),

as well as identifying potential beneficiary institutions and other stakeholders.


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Who initiated the Study

The European Commission - on behalf of the Pacific Region of the African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) Group of States

within the framework of the 10th EDF* Intra-ACP Development CooperationACP Connect for Research and Education Networks Programme

* = European Development Fund


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Why?

Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific Islands are the most underserved parts of the world, particularly with respect to affordable high-speed telecommunications infrastructure, and exploiting that infrastructure to improve education, health, societal benefit and research outcomes. REN initiatives are well advanced now in Africa and the Caribbean, but much less so among most of the Pacific Islands.


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Undersea Cable Deployment - the underserved

As of mid-2012, only 21 nations and territories remain isolated from fibre optic connectivity, though projects are underway in many of these markets at the time of writing (Submarine Cable Industry Report, Issue 1, July 2012, Submarine Telecoms Forum, Inc.)

The Pacific Island Nations and Territories together with Timor Leste account for more than half of these


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Much Interest in addressing these issues for the Pacific Islands

World Bank; Asian Development Bank; AusAID; NZAID, JICA, ITU, UNESCO Asia Pacific Telecommunity Pacific Islands Telecommunications Association ACP Group of States, EC U Hawaii; NSRC, NSF Pacific Telecommunications Council Pacific ICT Regulatory Resource Centre New players and partners of influence


TARGET COUNTRIES for this Study

• A number of Pacific Island Countries consist of many islands• The region spans 6 different time zones• Largest population more than 6 million (PNG), smallest just over 1,000 (Niue)• Recent political challenges in some • Critical survival conditions for others (eg Kiribati due to threat of sea level rise)• low priority of REN issues relative to other pressing social and environmental needs

SIOLI Marco (DEVCO)

not useful


8ACP Pacific Country

GDP PPP per capita Ranking

Population (2011 Est.)

Internet Usage as at 31 Dec 2011

% Population (Penetration)

REN Cable Landing To

Papua New Guinea 150 6,187,591 125,000 2.00% PNG-

ARNetAPNG-2PPC-1

Australia & Guam

activeactive

East Timor 143 1,177,833 2,361 0.20% SoI Asia

Fiji 129 833,125 162,880 18.40% USP-NetSCCN

ICNTonga Cable

AU & HawaiiVanuatuTonga

active20132013

Solomon Islands 138 571,890 26,907 4.70% USP-Net SOC to PPC-1 Guam 2013

Vanuatu 125 224,564 19,172 8.50% USP-Net ICN Fiji 2013

Samoa 113 193,161 12,816 6.60% USP-Net SAS Am SamoaHawaii active

Micronesia 156 106,836 22,213 20.80% HANTRU1 Guam activeTonga 104 105,916 12,487 11.80% USP-Net Tonga Cable Fiji 2013Kiribati 111 100,743 8,959 8.90% USP-Net Marshall Islands 149 67,182 6,540 9.70% USP-Net HANTRU1 Guam active

Palua 100 20,956 5,980 28.50% foreshadowed Guam 2014Cook Islands 11,124 6,000 53.90% USP-Net Tuvalu 137 10,544 4,300 40.80% USP-Net Nauru 124 9,322 340 3.60% USP-Net Niue 1,311 1,100 83.90% USP-Net Pacific 9,622,098 417,055 4.33%

9ACP Pacific Country

Higher Education, Technical and Vocational Education Institutions(more than 50 institutions)

Cook Islands USP

East Timor Universidade Nacional de Timor-Leste plus 9 others

Fiji USP; Fiji National University; University of Fiji

Kiribati USP; Institute of Technology; Fisheries Training Centre; Marine Training Centre; School of Nursing; Teachers College

Marshall Islands USP; College of the Marshall Islands

Nauru USP

Niue USP

Papau New Guinea

Uni of PNG; Uni of Technology; Uni of Natural Environment & Resources; Uni of Goroka; Divine Word Uni; Pacific Adventist Uni; Don Bosco Technological Institute; Institute of Business Studies; National Polytechnic Institute; plus 3 technical colleges and 3 business colleges

Samoa USP; National University of Samoa

Solomon Islands USP; Solomon Islands College of Higher Education

Tonga USP; Institute of Education; Institute of Higher Education ; Institute of Science and Technology; Tupou Tertiary Institute; Pouono Technical Institute; Health Training Centre ; Queen Salote School of Nursing

Tuvalu USP; Maritime Training Institute

Vanuatu USP; Institute of Technology; College of Nursing; Agriculture College; Institute of Teacher Education; Maritime College; Fisheries Centre

http://www.internetworldstats.com/pacific.htm


New submarine cable infrastructure

11/05/2102 10

Solomons

Yap

Palau

Current and Planned Cable Systems in the Pacific Island Region


Established 1968Established 196812 member countries 12 member countries Multi owned and multi Multi owned and multi funded funded 33million Sq Km ocean33million Sq Km ocean

USP SERVING THE PACIFIC ISLAND USP SERVING THE PACIFIC ISLAND COUNTRIESCOUNTRIES


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CONCEPTUAL REN


Global view


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Opportunities as part of the global NREN community

Immediate access to massive teaching and learning resources Opportunity to participate in regional and global collaborations Societal benefit

Improving lives as a result of implementing advanced communications that support the well-being of the population (eg access to expertise 1000’s of km away, disaster warning and mitigation) - examples

Catalysing and stimulating the information economyProviding services to transform business, society, and personal lives. Implementing collaborative innovation and access to information Acting as incubator for technology transfer to industry and commerce


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Research vs Societal Benefit agenda Good networking can vastly improve societal benefit When combined with a research agenda eg

earthquake modeling/prediction climate change research remote immersive diagnostic systems for patient assessment bioinformatics research to improve response and mitigation of emerging

infectionsa compelling case may result

Drivers depend on the needs of the country concerned and the ability to support the initiatives


Structure of the Study (1)

Inception Report Desk Study Field Phase Synthesis phase

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Structure of the Study (2)

More than 70 individual contributors (mainly face-to face) Contributions from more than 40 organisations Compilation and analysis of relevant studies already undertaken Assessment of the Regulatory Environment Identification of the Education and Research Requirements Identification of potential user Institutions of a Pacific REN

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Findings, Roadmap, Awareness Raising

Deficiencies in Information Exchange between R&E Institutions and between relevant Ministries

Limited extent of current R&E Networking among the target countries of the Study

Factors to address for enhanced uptake of undersea cable capacity Regional initiatives, potential synergies and potential sources of funding Development of a Roadmap and Awareness Raising

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Observations

Mostly, among the ACP Pacific Target countries, education, human capacity building and societal benefit have higher priority than research

High costs for local and international telecommunication infrastructures and services are a significant obstacle

Insufficient understanding for R&E traffic and consequences in terms of peering and funding agreements

In those target countries where the pricepoint of mobile broadband (3G) is affordable, significant transformation is already occurring – well suited to Pacific Island situatiions where fixed instrastructure deployment has challenges.


R&E landscape

All target countries recognise the importance of ICT and Internet access to support Education, at all levels (from primary to tertiary).

In addition to USP, more than 40 other post-secondary/tertiary institutions are located in the PICs, which may be part of the membership base of a Pacific regional REN (PacREN)

University of South Pacific is a regionally based institution with campuses in 12 PICs. It is an almost unique arrangement of being like a Regional REN, but for a single institution. But there is no NREN in Fiji, ie USP’s main campus in Suva doesn’t network interconnect with the National University of the University of Fiji over shared infrastructure.


National infrastructures

Only PNG has something approaching an NREN (PNG-Arnet), which is organised as a satellite service, of which the hub station is located in Singapore.

It is complemented by a 10 Mbps leased line (on PPC-1) to access the commercial Internet in Sydney.

At the national level, the R&E institutions consensus has still to be enhanced

There is no arrangement for R&E traffic exchanges with other PICs, nor with TEIN nor AARNet

PNG has two significantly underutilised cable systems (one to Australia and one to both Australia and Guam)


Regional initiatives

AusAID (Australia): Pacific Tertiary Education Strategy 2020 (funding: $85 Million over 4 years) to improve access to tertiary education in a number of PICs, including the establishment of a Pacific Regional Research and Education Network

Univesity of Hawaii, NSRC and the US-NSF EAGER Award to engage R&E community and other stakeholders for research networking in the PICs.


Regional initiatives

UNESCO CONNECT-Asia initiative and School on the Internet (SoI), with support of Japan’s WIDE program and a number of APAN Members. UNTL (Timor Leste) is involved both with Connect-Asia and SoI.

ACP-Connect study was introduced at the last Connect-Asia meeting in Jakarta (July 2012) with UNESCO, SoI and APAN expressing willingness to help.

SIOLI Marco (DEVCO)

may be it should not be indicated that the study has been presented at the public before the debriefing...let s talk about that

SIOLI Marco (DEVCO)

it is better not to tell that the study has been already presented in a meeting (before the presentation at ACP Sec)


Roadmap: National level

Three possible scenarios are proposed to match all the possible PIC configurations:Standard NREN (A)Shared resources for Education (B) Internet only (C)


Roadmap: National level

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Roadmap: Regional level

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A mix of submarine cables circuits and satellite services is proposed. It supposes that non-ACP countries will be allowed to participate (and

contribute) as non-beneficiaries (much like in the TEIN setup). A core ring between Guam, PNG, Sydney, Fiji and Hawaii,

complemented with cable circuits to Tonga, Vanuatu, Solomons, Samoa, Palau, Marshalls and Micronesia, and satellite services.

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Proposed governance is a regional organisation, similar to the USP setup, of which the country representatives should be the NRENs (A or B types).

C type countries will be invited to join at the time they will migrate from C to B or A…

Significant effort is needed to explain the benefit and cost efficiency of distinguishing R&E traffic from commercial Internet, justifying dedicated circuits on submarine cables.

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Roadmap: Connectivity to global R&E

R&E access to I2/NLR/CANARIE, TEIN, SINET, APAN Members, GEANT through Guam, Hawaii - and AARNet, REANNZ through Sydney

Satellite hub(s) will need also to provide direct R&E peerings (TEIN and WIDE in Singapore or Hong Kong, O3B in Hawaii)

Transit negotiations with AARNet, TEIN, I2/NLR, APAN Members, etc. will need to be undertaken at the PacREN level

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RECOMMENDATIONS

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Twelve recommendations sorted into three groups are proposed:

•Architecture : R1 to R3•Regional Cooperation : R4 to R9•Awareness Raising : R10 to R12


ARCHITECTURE: Recommendation #1

Promote the need of a NREN strategy in all ACP countries, as a tool for improving the R&E sector and a requirement to participate to any regional network initiative

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Ensure the ACP countries validate and support the PacREN regional network principle, strategy and architecture.

ACP secretariat, together with the EC will need to play a significant role through the broad awareness recommendation

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Consider mobile broadband penetration as a key support mechanism to reach R&E users where fixed infrastructure deployment has challenges.

Take advantage of new paradigms like cloud-based services to concentrate on fundamental network functions not available on the market (eg net+ services)

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REGIONAL COOPERATION: Recommendations #4, #5, #6 and #7

Cooperation with AusAID, and engagement with their 2020 strategy (noting that AusAID’s strategy does not include all ACP countries)

Cooperation with University of Hawaii and NSRC for the US-NFS funded EAGER study (Guam and Hawaii should play key roles as hubs of a PacREN)

Cooperation with JICA and USP in the adaptation of the satellite components of USP-Net to the new cable availabilities to concentrate on pure satellite services for off-cable PICs. Interconnect with Japan via cables from Hawaii or Guam

Cooperation with the education delivery programs of UNESCO, SoI and the World Bank’s Global Development Learning Program

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Cooperation with Asian Development Bank and the World Bank (focus on economic development) which are key actors for new cable deployment (Tonga, Vanuatu, Solomons, etc.). - R&E may act as catalyst or even early adopters of cable infrastructure.

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REGIONAL COOPERATION: Recommendation #8


Cooperation with SPC (to be replaced), PICs and PIRRC, which may be key players for the administrative, governance & regulatory issues of PacREN. They may also play a key role in the broad awareness raising process.

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REGIONAL COOPERATION: Recommendation #9


AWARENESS RAISING: Recommendation #10, #11 and #12

Awareness raising of the R&E user community at the local and national levels.

Awareness raising of governments and ministries Awareness campaign through workshops/seminars in order to

enhance in a coordinated way, the sensitivity to NREN/RREN issues in all possible fora such as telecommunication conferences (like PITA or PTC), R&E events etc.

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Conclusions During the four phases of the assessment study, major challenges were

identified, including. Limited economic power Limited awareness of R&E networkingHigh telecommunication costs and limited cable footprint

A roadmap is proposed, based onNREN stage (A, B and C types are possible)RREN stage (PacREN) made of a cable circuit core infrastructure,

complemented with satellite services for sparsely distributed PICs (off-cable countries)

Vigourous awareness raising action is required to support both previous stages

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Documents

ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 1 ACP Dany Vandromme & George McLaughlin