African countries could have access to cheaper telecommunication in the near future after private firms agreed here Tuesday to jointly undertake a regional submarine cable linking the entire continent.

About 29 private and state-run entities, the shareholders of the East African Submarine Cable (EASSy), which unites state-run telecommunication entities and private data companies operating in the Indian Ocean states, Southern Africa and Eastern Africa have worked out a plan, which they said, could be fulfilled by March 2008.

Kenya is among the 13 Eastern and Southern African countries, including Ethiopia, Rwanda, Madagascar, Sudan, Zambia, Uganda, South Africa, and Burundi, who were present at a three-day meeting to work on the plan.

The officials from the 29 members of the EASSy project, among them 12 state-run telecom firms and telecom regulators and 17 semi- private investors, mostly a hybrid of foreign and state-owned firms operating mobile phone services, agreed on the financing.

The 29 stakeholders would jointly fund the project after they complete an open access and commercial arrangements, ownership structure as well as other issues, which the shareholders classify as "public interest" like landing stations and other financing gaps.

Experts estimate the project would cost 300 million U.S. dollars to implement but finer details regarding various technical issues on the project were the main agenda of the Tuesday meeting.

They were also discussing the commercialization arrangements.

Recently, some other African companies are also planning to set up submarine cables.

Kenya Data Network (KDN), a private company operating an independent Information Technology infrastructure in Kenya, said in Nairobi on Monday that it would begin laying a fiber optic cable covering Kenya, Uganda and the neighboring states.

"The most important aspect of an East African submarine fiber system is not the international access, which is necessary, but the interconnection of the countries in the region," said Kai Wulff, the KDN managing director.

Wulff said the regional underwater cable, which is meant to give Africa a cheaper access to the international telephony and Internet connectivity, would lead to a 50 percent drop in the cost of communications across Africa.

"Currently, a telephone call from Kenya to England is cheaper than one to the Democratic Republic of Congo, the system aims to change this anomaly," Wulff told journalists ahead of the planned launch of the regional underwater telephony system.

Kenyan officials have been concerned about the delays in contracting for the EASSy project and recently moved a step further to advertise for private gateway providers to help in the construction of the sub-marine cable linking Kenya to the United Arab Emirates.

According to Kenyan telecommunication planners, the lack of a sub-marine cable is to blame for the very high cost of telecommunication that Africa has to contend with.

It costs 1,000 dollars to rent a gigabyte of data every month in Africa while it costs about 20 dollars to rent the same capacity in the developed nations like Britain and the United States.

"We really need to address the issue of cost because Africa and Europe have different income levels which should be reflected in the cost of communication," Wulff urged.

He said the laying of the cable would reduce cost of communication in Kenya by 50 percent, as the system would not limit the amount of data to be transported.

Sources attending the Tuesday meeting in Nairobi said after agreements were reached on the financing arrangements and the inclusion of Mauritius, the project would be completed in March 2008 but the date for commencing the actual laying of the cables was set for a month's time.

Source: Xinhua