.
ISLAMABAD:
The government is expanding the country’s telecommunications spectrum to 600 megahertz, a move that is expected to increase Internet capacity by around 200 percent and significantly improve speed, stability and continuity of service, the National Assembly was told Thursday.
The Parliamentary Secretary for IT and Telecommunications, responding to questions during Question Time, said the rapid increase in internet usage in the last one or two years – driven by the digitization of government services, education, job portals and businesses – had put immense pressure on the existing network, leading to slow speeds and frequent outages.
He told the chamber that spectrum expansion would help reduce congestion, improve data flow and minimize service disruptions, adding that a tangible improvement in services was expected by the end of February once the process was completed.
The parliamentary secretary said that in many areas the problem was not the absence of telcos but technical constraints, including limited spectrum, backhaul congestion, power outages and delays in regulatory clearances.
