Optic cable laying ends in June

Laying of the East African Sub Marine System project will be complete by June next year.

The completion will make the process of linking ICT and health care provision known as e-health possible within the next nine months, a PS said on Thursday.

“The challenge will then be on the medics and the research bodies to provide the content that is supposed to make this kind of interaction possible,” Dr Bitange Ndemo of the Ministry of Information said.

Use of ICT

He spoke at a workshop on the use of ICT in the provision of health care. Dr Ndemo said the process would be boosted by the expected completion, by April next year, of laying a fibre optic network across the country.

The project is an initiative of the government and Etisalat of the United Arab Emirates, in which the parties have agreed to build the first undersea fibre optic cable between Mombasa and Fujaira in the Emirates.

The process, however, depends on the successful completion of the construction of two data centres in Nairobi.

The PS said the process to put up the data centre was in the last phases and involves the approval of the Nairobi City Council and other bodies such as the National Environment Management Authority. The construction is expected to cost $100 million (Sh7.5 billion).

Dr Ndemo said the marine cable and the fibre optic network will significantly reduce the cost of internet broadband from the current $7,000 (Sh525,000) per megabyte to less than $100 (Sh7,500).

Currently, universities and hospitals get internet access at subsidised rates with the government expected to pay $7 million (Sh525 million) for the subsidies until the undersea cable delivers cheaper broadband.