Pretoria - Communications Minister Faith Muthambi will tomorrow jet off to Mauritius to speak about the digital television revolution at the first summit of the NexTV CEO Africa 2016.
Minister Muthambi has been invited to participate and give a keynote address at the opening session of the two-day summit. On Thursday morning, the Minister is scheduled to address delegates on digitisation and the future of TV in Africa.
NexTV CEO Africa 2016 is an exclusive event that brings together the Anglophone and Francophone markets of sub-Saharan Africa and offers a unique opportunity to discuss strategic ventures, regulatory issues and will be a fantastic accelerator for business and for lobbying in the broadcasting industry.
Since there is no information communication and technology (ICT) or communications co-operation between Mauritius and South Africa, Minister Muthambi is expected to initiate bilateral engagements with her Mauritian counterpart, Minister of Technology, Communication and Innovation (TCI), Etienne Sinatambou.
Topics that are expected to dominate the two-day summit include the importance of Africa and impact on broadcasting services; addressing innovation, access and affordability challenges.
NexTV news is one of the leading specialised media in the TV industry and its reach extends to the operators and communities in different regions worldwide. Its daily news and websites are published by Dataxis and contain articles written by in-house journalists from across the globe.
More than 100 CEOs from influential players in the sector are expected to attend the two-day summit.
Digital process in SKA area
Meanwhile, Mauritius has completed the digital migration process and is amongst the four SADC member states that met the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) deadline.
Minister Muthambi will use the platform to inform delegates that connections of the digital terrestrial TV services in the core towns of the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) in the Northern Cape were completed in June this year.
The process saw all the households in the SKA area migrating from analogue to digital broadcasting. Over 3 700 households in the towns of Carnavon, Vanwyksvlei, Brandvlei, Vosburg and Williston have fully migrated to the digital platform.
Ahead of the ITU deadline last year, Minister Muthambi had already consulted her counterparts in Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and Mozambique, with the view to eliminate the risk of cross-border signal interference.
The ITU is no longer providing any protection to broadcasters who failed to migrate from analogue to digital broadcasting.
The South African government is already providing free STBs to five million poor TV-owning households and this shift is a reflection of government’s commitment to ensure that digital migration happens within the shortest time possible. - SAnews.gov.za
