Rural Broadband Initiative underway

The Government has completed negotiations for our Rural Broadband Initiative (RBI), which will deliver vastly improved broadband speeds and mobile phone services to rural New Zealand.

About half of rural homes cope with dial-up, and just 20 per cent have broadband. The Government’s initiative, (in partnership with Telecom and Vodafone), will see that jump to 86 per cent. It will also deliver ultra-fast broadband to 95 per cent of rural schools, meaning 97 per cent of all New Zealand schools will have access to speeds of at least 100 Mbps.

The new rural network will be achieved through the extension of Telecom’s existing fibre network and Vodafone building new cell phone towers and upgrading technology on existing infrastructure.

Competitors will be able to access rural broadband infrastructure and offer competitive prices to rural broadband customers.

National is working hard to build a better-connected, digitally-enabled, productive and growing economy and the Rural Broadband Initiative will ensure our rural communities do not miss out on the promise of the digital age.

More information: http://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/rural-broadband-initiative-underway