Nicta looks at plugging the gap

Internet rates have become prominent in discussions over the past weeks, being a costly burden shouldered by businesshouses and the public.
It is not a new topic when talking about much-needed changes for the country and as such, there is a need to take an active role in understanding the ICT sector and how it is regulated.
The ICT sector and, in particular, the telecommunications industry is divided into wholesale and retail segments when it comes to selling internet-related services.
The wholesale segment is a sort of a monopoly, excluding satellite, where internet from submarine cables is sold exclusively by DataCo while being regulated by Nicta to an extent.
Nicta is also looking into certain wholesale services, including telecommunications towers, broadband services and international submarine cable transmission and capacity services to determine whether such services should be subjected to regulatory oversight.
Nicta chief executive Charles Punaha said they were in the process of negotiating internet pricing for the Coral Sea Cable service and expecting it to be set at a wholesale price of US$100 megabit per month.
Nicta aims to regulate wholesale services to protect or increase competition and prevent excessive pricing for related retail services, which is ultimately borne by consumers.
The retail segment has always been a bit unclear on how much regulatory powers the government has in controlling internet pricing.
There is no doubt that internet pricing has come down progressively in the past decade, thanks to Nicta and the competition that has been facilitated.
The retail rates were at the very least bearable, until the overnight 100 per cent increase by bmobile last month.
This sudden spike in price caused obvious public outrage and put internet pricing control at the forefront of public debate, again leading all the way to Parliament when at question time East Sepik Governor Allan Bird queried Minister for State Owned Enterprises William Duma.
Duma, after trying to to justify the increase, deflected the question by saying that the Independent Consumer and Competition Commission (ICCC) was responsible for providing regulatory oversight and it was happy with the price increases
In reaction to that, ICCC Commissioner Paulus Ain quickly clarified that although they had a broad claim to the issue in terms of looking out for consumers and competition, the pricing in the industry were under Nicta’s scope.
This led on to a frustrating revelation that Nicta was unable to control retail internet rates set by the mobile operators.
There is no general requirement in the Nicta Act or in the operator licenses it issues requiring service providers to seek regulatory approval for new prices, price
changes or service price withdrawals for retail services in the country.
This loophole in Nicta’s powers was further mentioned in the timely Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Business Advisory Council micro to small medium-sized enterprises and innovation summit this week.
Minister for Information and Communications Technology Sam Basil said during his presentation that steps were being taken to enable Nicta to play an oversight role in the pricing of internet services.
He said those steps would involve working with other relevant agencies and also holding a public inquiry based on a discussion paper that was being formed by Nicta.
The feedback received from this would form the basis of a report recommending Basil to make a retail service determination on retail pricing for internet, allowing Nicta to have regulatory oversight on retail price changes.
Punaha urged consumers and businesshouses to contribute to the discussion paper, saying past calls by Nicta for public feedback had been answered mainly by mobile operators.
This call made to the mobile data subscribers to submit to Nicta their views and for businesshouses to have their IT managers also submit an overview on their thoughts about regulating internet pricing in the retail sector.
A timeline for this process was not mentioned but Nicta was expected to make announcement soon.
The process to control internet prices in the retail sector o has picked up traction and anyone who has qualms about it should support Nicta to see the change happen.