Annual Directors’ Coordination Conference - Ministry of Communications & IT

A 2-day conference aimed to have better cooperation between central and provincial Directors of Ministry of Communication & IT (MCIT), Afghan Telecom managers, identifying problems and challenges of provincial telecommunication plans, normal and devolvement budget for covering the rural area.

The conference was held at Information and Communication Technology Institute (ICTI). The Participants were Minister of MCIT, Deputy Minster (Technical), Deputy Minster (F&A), and Board of Directors of MCIT, a delegation of Telecommunication Sector of National Assembly, provincial directors and authorities of Afghan Telecom representative of media.

At the beginning Minister of Communications and IT H.E. Amirzai Sangin  welcoming  the guests and said: this is the matter of pleasure that once again we convene to evaluate our yearly activities, find out shortages and challenges we faced and the way of solution, discuss, exchange information and share good practices with each other.

H. E. Amirzai Sangin enumerated the goal of the gathering as follow:

1. Evaluation the past year’s activities and functions.

2. Discussion the Plan for next year.

3. Sharing challenges and obstacles that we have been faced.

4. Getting ideas and finding the best way for solution the problems.

Sangin added: that despite problems and security issues in the country we have significant achievement in the field of telecommunication services. We have started from zero and made considerable consequential progress.  Even we have taken precedence over other countries in the region.  We were faced with threats and lost 300 towers, we determined to restore them and we did it by assistance of private companies. Now our countrymen benefit advanced telecommunication and information technology services, we have provided facilities and ease access of the population to internet services with affordable prices. We extended Fiber Optic and brought advanced 3G and licensed it to government and private communication companies, prices of internet decreased from 4000 dollars in less than 100 dollar.  We would like to endeavor providing telecommunication and IT services to harsh terrain and mountainous areas and the e- government in the country and to promote it in all spheres of life of the people. It is of great importance to mention that distribution of e-NID will begin in a month. There has been invested 2 billion dollars in mobile phone sector and 200000 individuals are provided with job opportunities, and also we have made revenue of 189 million dollars within 8 months of the year.

He appreciated the work of Afghan Telecom and added: that it had successes in some months it has 1.5 million subscribers and tis revenue reaches to 65 million dollars. Afghan Telecom is given 3G and GSM license, which will be in operation in next year. H. E. Sangin also mentioned that in some extent it has not succeeded. Amirzai Sangin spoke about importance and bettering the quality of Postal services in the country in details and said: that the lack of proper address system has created a lot of problems it is cause difficulty to find the address.  One of our new measures and initiatives are creating an international address standard, which we will do it in close cooperation with municipalities and it will be: 1. Traditional street address number, 2. Number on each house. Now we are working on digital map of Kabul city, which will be installed on mobile phones, cars and computers and everyone will be able to find the address easily and also we will equip our Post system with modern and new technology to deliver express postal services.

 And also he explained the improvement of Telecom Sector in Afghanistan in the last decade. He mentioned that location for the satellite is one of the natural resources of the country. It could be installed & utilized soon at 50 degree at east. After that through satellite broadcasting of the whole country will be covered by providing communication facility of it. It is very important for the governance to be in touch with all areas with better performance.

There should be some rules & regulations for Afghan TVs, everybody can't run TV anymore.as you know that MCIT provides frequency for them, and therefore MCIT has to play a role on it. For the time being broadcasting of TVs is analog and will be converted to digital system. It will be broadcasted via Satellite in future and Afghan broadcasting will be accessible in each angle of the country as well as abroad. It will increase in the revenues of state treasury. With satellite services, a single tower will be installed in each province and every TV can broadcast their programs from the same tower, so it will decrease expenses.

latter , member of Telecommunications Commission of Walosi Jirga (Parliament) Mrs.  Nasima Niazi praised outstanding success and achievements of MCIT and further she said that holding such conference is important to improve services in the country

Second day of Conference: all the provincial directors of MCIT consequently   presented their annual reports to the audience and pointed the existing problems and challenges they were faced and presented their propositions.

 At the end: achievements of the conference evaluated by H.E. Wahabbudin Sadaat Deputy Minister (F&A) of MCIT and said:  “as a united team we all work together in a close cooperation  to accomplish the plan and tackle the  problems and challenges that we face in provincial levels as far as possible”.