Accra, April 23, GNA - The National Communications Authority (NCA) has said it would soon license separate private companies to install telecom infrastructure purposely for co-location. This, it said, was to create some sanity in the mounting of telecom masts across the country and also free the hands of the operators to concentrate on providing quality service.

Mr Joshua Peprah, Director of Regulatory and Administration at the NCA, announced this at a day's workshop on Wednesday for stakeholders in the communication industry, organised by the Environmental Protection Agency to address issues of telecom mast erection vis-a-vis public perceptions and complaints about their health, safety and environmental implications.

He noted that by the end of the first quarter of this year, there were about 3,000 telecom masts across the country, comprising 1,652 for MTN, 699 for TIGO, 378 for Vodafone, 250 for Zain and 112 for Kasapa. Some of the operators told GNA recently that they had agreed on 100s of cell sites for co-location to enable them to serve respective subscribers using each other's infrastructure, but they have not realised even one of those agreements.

Mr Peprah noted that, when the individual operators installed their infrastructure years ago, they did not anticipate the need for co-location in the future so it had become difficult for them to share their existing infrastructure.

"We trust that the third party infrastructure providers that we will license in the near future will install adequate infrastructure at strategic points across the country to enable operators to share quality service," he said.

Mr Peprah noted that it was an irony for the public to expect quality service from the operators and yet complain about telecom base stations in their neighbourhoods.

"The public needs to understand that without the telecom masts, the service operators cannot provide the quality service expected of them." He noted that the fear about the dangers of non-ionising radiation from telecom masts to people's health was not real, saying that scientific research had proved that non-ionising radiations had the least effect on human health and did not pose any more danger than other emissions.

Mr Peprah said besides the National Fibre Optics Backbone, and the SAT 3 undersea fibre optics cable, individual operators and a third party had been licensed to install more fibre optics cables both offshore and undersea to increase the country's local and international bandwidth.

He said the purpose was to boost the country's competitive edge within the sub-region for lucrative outsourcing jobs from the international market.

"When we have adequate, clean and reliable international bandwidth, we will carve a niche for ourselves in the international outsourcing market and that way enterprises will not hesitate to establish anywhere in the country outside of the capital.

"But we need the citizenry to come along with us on this because without the telecom masts, we can't extend the benefits of the bandwidths to the rest of the country.

He assured the public that the NCA had acquired equipment to closely monitor the operators for sanity and quality and would do everything to ensure that public concerns were adequately addressed along with the decent expansion of the telecom industry.

Giving an overview of the communication industry, he said currently there were five cellular phone operators, MTN, TIGO, ZAIN, KASAPA, and Vodafone; two fixed line operators, Vodafone and Zain; 35 internet service providers; 146 FM radio stations and 14 TV stations. He said from less than one million telecom lines in the country in 2003, the current number of telephone line has crossed 12 million, constituting about 55 per cent population penetration and was projected to reach 60 per cent penetration in 2010.

Mr Peprah said out the total, the market leader, MTN, had 54 per cent market share, TIGO, 23 per cent, Vodafone, 14 per cent, Zain, five per cent, and Kasapa, three per cent, adding that Vodafone currently had 160,000 fixed lines.

"The sixth licensed operator, Glo Mobile, will start operations in the middle of this year," he said.

Mr Jonathan Allotey, Executive Director of EPA, noted that the EPA received a myriad of complaints from the public about telecom masts; 40 per cent of which are about perceived health concerns, 33 per cent about closeness to homes and schools, 2.3 per cent about lack of neighbourhood consent before erection of masts; as well as noises and fumes from standby generators.

He said there had been complaints from Sunyani about a mast falling down and destroying property, and also posing aviation risks particularly in Takoradi, where aircraft found it difficult when approaching landing because of telecom masts in their way. Mr Allotey said there was the need to make telecom mast socially acceptable by the operators desisting from erecting masts without permits, showing commitment to co-location and undertaking vigorous public education about telecom masts to allay people's fears. "We propose that whereas it is too early to make co-location legally binding, it should be possible to make it a licensing requirement.

"On our part as permit agencies, we will revisit the draft guidelines for the mounting of telecom masts and expedite action on its implementation, continue with comprehensive public education, enforce our laws to ensure that operators provide the periodic reports on radiation test, structural stability test and ensure that they do comprehensive insurance on their infrastructure," he said.