Nigerians will pay an estimated N691bn to receive digital broadcast signals on their television sets when the nation transits from analogue to digital terrestrial broadcasting by 2015, National Mirror has gathered.
Each viewing home is expected to invest some money in purchasing a Set-Top Box, STB, a device required to connect to their television sets in order to receive digital signals.
Experts in broadcasting sector have confirmed that an STB will cost $100 (about N15,700) and with 44 million viewing homes in the country, the amount to be expended is conservatively estimated at N691bn.
The Director-General, National Broadcasting Commission, NBC, Mr. Yomi Bolarinwa, confirmed the number of viewing homes in the country to National Mirror.
Also, the cost of STB ownership was confirmed by experts from the Southern African Digital Broadcasting Association, SADIBA, who attended the Digital Dialogue Nigeria forum in Lagos recently.
Bolarinwa said: “Though it may be difficult to state categorically the number of television sets we have in Nigeria, I can confirm to you that recent surveys have indicated that Nigeria now has about 44 million television viewing homes and each of this household is expected to own an STB as a basic requirement for digital television transition.”
Apart from the digital satellite TV services being offered by MultiChoice, owners of Dstv and StarTimes, which is an arm of the Nigerian Television Authority, running on an entirely different digital platform from the NTA network, most broadcasting stations in Nigeria are still operating on analogue platform for their transmission.
This, it was learnt, would change by 2015, when Nigeria is expected to have joined other countries in the world in successfully transiting from the current analogue television system to digital broadcasting.
However, in spite of Nigeria’s plan to transit from analogue to digital broadcasting by June 17, 2015, experts have regretted that the Federal Government is yet to release the White Paper meant for the implementation of the digitalisation project.
Though National Mirror learnt that the Federal had on April 4, 2012 endorsed the White Paper recommendations on the transition from analogue to digital terrestrial broadcasting in the country by a Presidential Advisory Committee, the final outcome of the document was yet to be made public.
A broadcasting engineer, Mr. Edward Amana, expressed surprise on the delay in releasing the White Paper for the transition.
“As I speak with you, we have not seen the White Paper that provides for the implementation framework for the digital transition and we think with this kind of forum and opinions expressed here, government would remember how important it is to have the White Paper on time in order to ensure that the 2015 deadline is met,” he said.
Amana said a policy-driven approach was needed by developing countries, including Nigeria, for the switch-over, stressing that it was important for the country to meet the 2015 deadline.
“If by 2015, Nigeria decides to keep to its analogue system, there may be signal interference from other neighbouring countries that have switched over and if this happens, no regulator, international or regional, will listen to us.
“If on the basis of our decision not to switch, we interfere with other countries’ broadcasting space, we would be sanctioned. So, the best option is for us to switch over by 2015,” he said.
The engineer urged the government to provide incentives for companies that would be involved in local content production to drive the digital transition process, adding that capacity building on new engineering knowledge for digital broadcasting is critical.
He noted that the transition would also require the use of set-up boxes to receive digital contents which he said the government was working on to manufacture in Nigeria.
The Minister of Communications Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson, had recently said that the Federal Government was considering local manufacturing of the STB at subsidised rates for Nigerian users.
“By manufacturing the STB in Nigeria, Nigeria will prevent capital flight that will happen if the huge amount of money expected to be spent by Nigerians is retained locally, though government is also looking at subsidising the cost to make it affordable by all,” she said. Over the years, access to analogue television sets by household has increased in Nigeria.
According to a report by the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, less than half of the population (44.7 per cent) had access to a television set in 2011.
Of this percentage, about one-third of the population (13.3 per cent) actually owned the television.
The report entitled “NBS report on ICT access for 2011,” says distribution according to geographic region indicates that access to television is substantially higher in the urban area compared to the rural areas at 78.6 per cent and 35.7 per cent respectively.
Also, the pattern of ownership is higher at the urban (26.9 per cent) than rural areas (9.6 per cent).
Disaggregation by state shows that at 93 per cent, Lagos State recorded the highest number of persons with total access to TV, out of which slightly above 30 per cent claimed they actually own TV.
This is followed by Anambra State with 83 per cent total access to TV. Other States with more than 75 per cent total access to TV are Osun, Ogun, Delta and Edo states.