Azernews.Az

By Nigar Orujova

The Azerbaijani State Oil Fund (SOFAZ) will begin funding a project for the development of broadband Internet in the country following the preparation of a reform package, SOFAZ head Shahmar Movsumov told reporters on May 10.

SOFAZ allocated 103 million manats ($131 million) for the project this year. Funding will also be provided in the coming years. All regions of Azerbaijan will be provided with high-speed access to the Internet by 2017.

"The project envisages great reforms and preparatory work is already underway. I believe the project will start after a package of reforms is formed and approved, which could happen later this year," he said.

Implementation of the project for the development of broadband Internet, Fibre to the Home (FTTH) project, in Azerbaijan will cover the period of 2013-2017.

The FTTH technology guarantees extensive capacities, with the data transfer speed reaching dozens of megabits.

The traffic speed in FTTH technology will vary between 10 and 100 Mbit/s, while with ADSL the private user can enjoy only 2 to 8 Mbit/s speed depending on the telephone line's condition and distance from the telephone exchange being used.

The "Fiber to Home" is expected to be implemented in three phases. The main goal of the project is to provide remote regions of the country with broadband Internet with a speed of 10 to 100 Mbit/s and expand the number of users to 85 percent.

Azerbaijan has maintained its leading position among the CIS countries in terms of broadband Internet penetration over the past three years. Internet penetration rates increased from 65 to 70 percent in 2012. Operations were conducted to improve the quality of data transmission services. The capacity of international communication channels more than doubled compared to 2011 and prices were reduced by 35 percent.

At present, Internet fees for connection speed of 1 Mbit/s account for about 3 percent of the average wage in Azerbaijan. For comparison's sake, the fees are up to 20 percent of wages in developing countries.