(Jamaica Gleaner) The government has started to roll out an ambitious multimillion-dollar project designed to place high-speed Internet in schools, post offices and public libraries across the island within 18 months.
“Any community, however remote, which has a public secondary or high school will be provided with facilities for Internet access,” Daryl Vaz, the minister with responsibility for technology, announced yesterday.
“This project is anticipated to facilitate modern services such as videoconferencing and more efficient use of our teaching resources through the establishment of virtual classrooms.
“These resources will allow students to access stored subject matter lessons and to take online practice tests and examinations,” Vaz added at the contract signing.
Under the five-year project, financed by the Universal Access Fund, two telecommunications providers, LIME and Flow, will be paid a total of $543 million over five years to roll out the Internet service at 283 institutions islandwide initially.
The two companies have also been contracted to provide the service with a 99.9 per cent availability and a target of no more than a cumulative total of 8.77 hours service degradation or downtime each year.
