According the LIRNEasia’s 2011 Telecom Regulatory Environment (TRE) survey, stakeholders in India, Pakistan and Indonesia have identified the telecom regulatory environments in their countries as improved since 2008, the last time the survey was carried out.   In contrast, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, the Philippines have seen the regulatory environments decline in effectiveness, while Thailandremains more-or-less the same.

The TRE Survey asks senior level stakeholders to evaluate the effectiveness of the telecom regulatory environment in the fixed, mobile and broadband subsectors along a Lickert scale of 1 to 5 (1 being highly ineffective and 5 being highly effective, with the mid-point of 3 being considered average performance).  Seven different dimensions of regulation (market entry, tariff regulation, interconnection, universal service, anti-competitive-practices, quality of service) are evaluated by the stakeholders.    This year, 349 responded participated in the 7 countries.

Within a country, scores for each of the dimensions reflect specific issues: for example, in India, the lowest score (of 2.3 out of 5) was received by the Access to Scarce Resources dimension in the mobile-sub-sector.  This is perhaps not surprising given the 2G scandals in India.  However, India did finally get around to allocating 3G spectrum in 2010, and did so by having its first ever spectrum auctions. Perhaps because of this, or because stakeholders believe that that the 2G scandal has finally paved way for transparency in allocation, the score of 2.3 this year is still an improvement, though marginal,  over the 2008 score of 2.2.   India’s USD 4 billion+ undisbursed Universal Service Fund and related policies are responsible for its biggest TRE score decline: the TRE for USO drops from 3.1 in 2008 to 2.4 this year.  In contrast, tariff regulation in the mobile sub-sector continues to be the top performer with a score of 3.9 out of 5.0, indicating stakeholder satisfaction at TRAI’s policy of forbearance which has enabled Indian consumers to enjoy extremely low prices thanks to competitive forces.

Pakistan saw an increased in almost all dimensions, with the exception of 3 (fixed market entry, mobile access to scarce resources and mobile interconnection) which showed minor declines.   In contrast, Bangladesh saw scores in all seven fixed-subsector dimensions decline, in some cases by as much as 1 point.  The scores are perhaps reflective of the issues related to the cancellation of several fixed licenses.  Overall only seven dimensions showed improvements in Bangladesh, and even these were marginal.   Thailand, whose overall performance is unchanged, has however seen significant declines in its Market Entry scores due the uncertainties caused by the concession contracts granted to the mobile operators and what their status would be when they expire starting next year.

Detailed analysis of the scores is available in the draft country reports for Pakistan, India, Thailand, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and Bangladesh.

A comparative country analysis is also available online.

All reports and analysis is in draft form at present. We hope you will comment on the country reports and cross country comparisons so that we may improve our analysis.

M. Somasekhar’s piece on Hindu Business Line on mobile payments says:

Experts from Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Kenya, Thailand, the Philippines, Bhutan and Bangladesh among other nations met in Islamabad recently to discuss their experiences in providing mobile phone services for the BoP segment in their respective countries. They agreed that a beginning has been made and the road ahead appeared daunting, but technological progress promised quick results.

Don Sambandaraksa’s  piece “Mobile phones offer hope to ‘bottom of the pyramid” to Bangkok Post focuses on mobile use in farming, transport and banking. Says he:

“ICTs cannot solve all problems, chief of which is land reform, but when it comes to making decisions, lowering transaction costs and going to market and selling, information can make a big difference.

The researched categorised the decision-making process and information value in each from decisions to seed, planting, growing to harvesting and selling.

Information search costs are highest at the beginning of the cycle. Information on deciding what to grow are three times all other costs, and this is where ICTs have a potential role to play.

Sriganesh Lokanathan said that ideally he wanted to change the decision-making chain into a cycle where the decision on what the farmer wants to grow is based on the price when he expects to harvest. For this to happen, prices and supply and demand needed to be predicted and farmers need to get into forward sales contracts which does not often happen in this part of the world.”

Meanwhile we see Pakistan Telecom Authority, the co-organiser takes the message forward. ‘PTA Focuses on Value-Added Services Including E-Commerce, E-Agriculture & E-Education’ was the title of a report from Pakistan Telecom News Bulletin. It says:

Chairman, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) Dr. Mohammed Yaseen has said that PTA’s focus is on value added services and with a high penetration level of mobile and low penetration of internet we have to explore the available possibilities which could be gained via mobile 2.0 theories. I very much foresee the further development of presently available technologies and those coming ahead through value added services and content. He was addressing to Connect 2010 ICT Forum – Telecom Session at Expo Centre Karachi and talking to media men on the occasion. He said that our emphasis is on e-commerce, e-agriculture and e-education, it is the time to open doors of opportunities to our young innovative minds and to bridge the unseen gaps between all potentials players of ICT proliferation.

For the full media coverage and presentations,  please see here.

Harsha De Silva speaking on ‘mPayments in Public Transport’. The session was chaired by Yaseen Anwar, Deputy Governor, State Bank of Pakistan

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Mobile 2.0 describes the next wave of applications and services – the use of mobiles for more than voice. On the 26^th and 27^th of April 2010, LIRNEasia together with the PTA co-hosted a successful expert forum in Islamabad, Pakistan. A multitude of themes were discussed over the four sessions, when the experts presented their research and cases to an audience that consisted of those representing regulators, mobile operators, government agencies and the media from nine countries of the Asia Pacific region.

Day 1: Opening Session

Welcome Speech I: Prof. Rohan Samarajiva, PhD, Chair and CEO, LIRNEasia

Welcome Speech II: Rashid Khan, CEO, Mobilink

Address by Chief Guest: Sardar Muhammad Latif Khan Khosa, Advisor to Prime Minister on IT

Day 2: Expert Forum

Session 1: Beyond voice (Easing payments, making markets efficient)

Chair: Yaseen Anwar, Deputy Governor, Banking Supervision and Corporate Services, State Bank of Pakistan

Sriganesh Lokanathan, LIRNEasia – Leveraging Mobile 2.0 for Agricultural Market Access [Policy Brief]

Harsha de Silva, PhD, LIRNEasia – mPayments in Public Transport: The case of bus tickets in Sri Lanka [Policy Brief]

Muriuki Mureithi, Summit Strategies, Kenya – mPayments experience in Kenya

Aamir Ibrahim, Chief Strategy Officer, Telenor Pakistan – Mobile 2.0: The telenor experience with EasyPaisa

Session 2: Beyond voice (mGovernment, mCommerce, mSocial Networking)

Chair: Syed Nasrul Karim Ghaznavi, Member (Finance), Pakistan Telecommunication Authority

Shazna Zuhyle, LIRNEasia (on behalf of Ayesha Zainudeen) – Mobile Markets: What works in emerging Asia? [Policy Brief]

Puree Sirasoontorn, LIRNEasia – BuzzCity [Policy Brief]

Prof. Rohan Samarajiva, PhD, LIRNEasia (on behalf of Prof. Subhash Bhatnagar) – eGovernance using mobile platform [Policy Brief]

Parvez Iftikar, CEO, Universal Service Fund – Telecom for all

Session 3: Conditions for Mobile 2.0 (Market entry)

Chair: Khawar Siddique Khokhar, PhD, Member (Technical), Pakistan Telecommunication Authority

Helani Galpaya & Payal Malik, LIRNEasia – Unleashing the potential of mobile 2.0 technologies through efficient spectrum management [Policy Brief]

Prof. Rohan Samarajiva, PhD, LIRNEasia – Mobile number portability [Policy Brief]

Muhammad Talib Dogar, Director General (Services), PTA (Pakistan’s experience with Mobile Number Portability) – Mobile number portability: Pakistan’s Experience

Session 4: Conditions for Mobile 2.0 (Quality of Service Experience)

Chair: Baburajan K., Executive Editor, Voice and Data

Chanuka Wattegama, LIRNEasia – User-centric Broadband Quality Monitoring Approach

Wasim Tauqir, Director General (Strategy & Development), PTA (Pakistan’s experience with Mobile Quality of Service) – Pakistan’s experience with Mobile Quality of Service

Panel Discussion: What Next?

Adnan Shahid, Director (Marketing) , Mobilink Pakistan

Adil Rauf, CEO, Alcatel Lucent, Pakistan

Wangay Dorji, Head- Telecommunications, Bhutan InfoComm and Media Authority

Grace Amberong, Information Technology Officer & Head of Government Portal and Website Development, CICT Philippines (Presentation)

Rohan Samarajiva, PhD, Chair & CEO LIRNEasia

Media Coverage:

Daily Times (Improvement of broadband penetration discussed)

The Hindu Business Line (Mobile 2.0 forum meet begins in Islamabad)

The Hindu Business Line (Pakistan plans big push for IT, rural telecom)

The Hindu Business Line (Connect to the Bottom of the Pyramid)

The Hindu Business Line (Pak ahead of India in use of Universal Service Funds)

The Hindu Business Line (Our telecom licensing is technology-neutral – Interview with Dr Mohommed Yaseen, Chairman, PTA)

Telecom News Bulletin (PTA and LIRNEasia jointly host International Telecom Expert Forum)

The Financial Express (Cell phone use yet to pick up in third world in absence of non-voice services)

The Sunday Times (Internet – unheard of, for many Lankans: Study)

Voice & Data (Pakistan to focus on flung areas for provision of broadband services)

Voice & Data (Telecom can strengthen our bonds in Pakistan)

Voice & Data (Pak Government is looking to expand in to non-voice)

State of Telecom Industry in Pakistan

Bangkok Post Tech (Mobile phones offer hope to ‘Bottom of the Pyramid’)

Bangkok Post Tech (Forum discusses ways to break cycle of poverty)

Bangkok Post Tech (India points the way)

The rankings are released by Point Topic Global broadband analysis, a global research centre. According to the statistics, there are around 382. 4 million broadband subscribers worldwide by the end of August 2008 as compared with 317 million in August 2007, showing 17 percent growth.

Regional Broadband trend revealed that Western Europe has the largest share of broadband users with 26 percent followed by North America at 22 percent. South and East Asia regional is in the third place with 22 percent share.

In Pakistan operators are offering wide range of technologies like DSL, Cable, FTTH and WiMax. They have added 25,500 new broadband connections in the financial year 2007-08, which is around 150 percent increase compared to the previous financial year, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) statistics reported.

The Internet Protocol (IP) traffic through high-speed access link has become the success factor that have made rapid the transfer of online information and communication services, data, voice and video footage. The easy way of communication owing to highly competitive market of service providers has been penetrating in the country with modest acceleration in the metropolis.

Read the full story in Daily Times here.

Chairman PTA said that for mobile phone industry future direction could be value addition and innovation in services including mobile commerce, video streaming, and high speed mobile internet.

He said presently broadband costs are high in the country but broadband usage was showing growth in the recent quarter. He said that PTA has carried out surveys to know the socio economic impact of mobile phone, which revealed that with the introduction of mobile communications productivity has increased significantly.

He said that the spectacular rise of telecom industry in Pakistan and especially the mobile sector has been the focus of attention. The sector has exhibited a growth rate of around 40 per cent over the previous year.

The mobile subscriber base has crossed the 90 million mark while still adding around 2 million subscribers each month and the growth trend continues. Today mobile coverage is available to over 90 per cent of the population and with implementation of upcoming technology the services will be available to almost entire population.

Chairman PTA said that our focus is on the proliferation of broadband services in the country at affordable rates. The Authority is aware of the developments taking place worldwide in the 3G mobile communications (mobile broadband).

Read the full story in ‘The News’ here.

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority ordered Internet providers to unblock the site Tuesday.

In a statement Tuesday, YouTube confirmed the Web site was again accessible in Pakistan. Company spokesman Ricardo Reyes says YouTube took down the particular link on Saturday, after receiving flags from the YouTube community and determining the content violated the Web site’s terms of use.

Read the full story in ‘VOA News’ here.