Kevin Nyango
TechInPacific – The Coral Sea Cable System (CS2) is undergoing a communication infrastructure project from Australia to Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands to provide a high-speed network that connects Honiara with Auki, Taro and Noro.
The Cable System will provide faster, cheaper, and more reliable communication infrastructure to support the economic growth and development in both countries.
The reasons behind the Cable System installation are that the undersea cable system from Sydney to Papua New Guinea will end soon while the Solomon Islands have no undersea cable system at all, causing the country to depend more on expensive as well as unreliable satellite communications.
Both Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands have been facing several challenges in developing their economy, thus, the slow and untrusted internet connectivity will add more obstacles to their economic growth. Moreover, it disintegrates people within the countries.
According to the World Bank research, a good internet access and connectivity will contribute to additional GDP of Pacific countries with over US$5 billion and add 300,000 additional jobs by 2040.
In order to support economic growth in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, Australia offers a help by providing ‘sustainable development and resilient technologies’. These technologies are expected to enable e-governance and deliver digital services within the countries.
In terms of developing economic growth in both Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, CS2 will support the entrepreneurship and digital skills in the countries, and additionally, help them to build more integration into the global marketplace. The support is a part of Australia’s International Cyber Engagement Strategy across the Indo-Pacific areas.
The Cable System Installation project is mainly funded by Australia under the Official Development Assistance while the one-third part of the project funded by the Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands Governments.
The cable infrastructure is expected to be done by the end of 2019.
