ISLAMABAD, April 8: Minister for Information Technology Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari on Thursday announced policy guidelines for global mobile personal communication services (GMPCS) by satellite to ensure cheaper and affordable telecom services for the remote and under-served areas.

A statement, issued from the office of the minister, stated that an open-technology, neutral and non-exclusive regime would be followed for this type of service to enhance coverage for the remote areas.

Tariffs for the service would be brought down to an affordable level to ensure a meaningful GMPCS presence in the country, besides improving rural coverage. Space segment (i.e., satellite constellations duly coordinated as per ITU regulations) should be licensed by the operator's home administration for which no further regulation was necessary, he said.

He explained that the GMPCS was a personal communication system providing trans-national, regional or global coverage from a constellation of satellites accessible with small and easily transportable terminals. It is capable of providing telecommunication services directly to end users.

The minister said GMPCS services now included two-way voice, fax, messaging, data and even broadband multimedia and according to international estimates, the GMPCS might constitute approximately 2-3 per cent of the cellular market.

Under the policy, the minister explained that the commercial agreements could be signed between parties on non-exclusive basis. However, the service providers would have to inform the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), before offering the GMPCS, besides information on coverage and quality of service, coordination with Frequency Allocation Board (FAB) would be required.

Awais Leghari explained that the GMPCS was universally recognized as a basic system for the development of telecom infrastructure and efforts would be made at policy-making level to make sure that the GMPCS be available on a non-discriminatory basis, be cost-effective and preserve the sovereignty of the country.

Setting up of common standards and uniform GMPCS regulations help address other issues such as security, tariffing, licensing, royalties, he said, adding that though GMPCS networks have specific characteristics, they generally share space segment (satellite constellation), ground segment (earth stations) and the user segment (terminals).

Awais Ahmad Khan said his ministry would also encourage setting up of public call offices (PCOs) in the rural areas, for which a reduced tariff was being discussed with the GMPCS providers.

At present M/s Thuraya is providing the GMPCS in collaboration with the Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL). As a result of this policy, other providers would also be able to start this service in Pakistan.