Internet: Will the prices drop?

By Milena Recio

HAVANA – On May 27, Cuba was informed that, beginning on June 4, the Cuban Telecommunications Company (ETECSA) will provide connections to the Internet to any natural person, resident or visitor, of any origin or nationality, from 118 points of access.

One of the most noteworthy aspects of the new service is the price, which is considered to be high. However, sources at ETECSA and the Vice Minister of Communications, Wilfredo González, said that the fee of 4.50 convertible pesos per hour (US$4.50) charged for international navigation, would surely be reevaluated in the next several months.

"We are aware that the initial fee for this service is high. As ETECSA recovers the investments it made, principally in the infrastructure of connectivity, information platforms, and the cost of international connections, the points of access will be gradually expanded and the performance of the service will be studied with the aim of lowering the fees, along the lines of what we’ve done with the cell-phone service."

Apparently, all will depend on obtaining financial resources and the necessary infrastructure to achieve a wider spread of the service. The current offering of 334 public-access points under the Nauta Plan is rather limited. We’re talking about one PC [personal computer] with Internet access for every 33,500 inhabitants, more or less.

The critical factors of this slim offer are not, authorities say, related to Cuba’s connection with the Internet, because the celebrated underwater fiber-optic cable ALBA-1 is handling most of the telecommunications (voice and data) and enabling a considerably better performance.

The bigger problems lie with the national networks, especially with that technologists call the last mile. Most of Cuba’s infrastructure is based on copper wiring, which is inefficient and, to a certain degree, outdated.

This is the result of a deficient capacity for investment, manifested in recent years, which has brought Cuba to the level of most of the other Latin American countries.

Last July, Fernando Rojas, coordinator for the Broadband Regional Observatory (ORBA), operated by CEPAL in Santiago, Chile, spoke with the BBC about the causes for the high price of broadband connections in Latin America.

User nations "continue to use copper networks because there is no market scale for investments, even though that depends on each country," Rojas said.

In Latin America, the possibilities for reverting this situation in harmony with the rest of the world are not at hand, due to lack of money, i.e., investments. Most of the governments cannot spend their slim resources narrowing the gap between megacities and semi-urban or rural areas.

Therefore, broadband connectivity continues to be on hold, especially for private capital. And there isn’t sufficient motivation for investments, either.

"It’s like replacing water pipes," says Carlos Cortés, a researcher at the Center for Studies on Freedom of Expression, at the University of Palermo, Buenos Aires. "To accomplish the change is expensive and slow, and it’s difficult to find clients that will pay for it."

"It is a technology that does not necessarily deliver a financial return to its owner. When there are few users, the investment made in bringing broadband to a remote town is hard to recoup or is not justified."

It’s the simple and plain logic of the market, which rules over other criteria. And Cuba should not renounce those criteria, even if it has to bring itself, rationally and efficiently, into mercantile logic.

According to the Cuban authorities, the critical path of the prices for Internet access will be the same as that of prices for cell telephony since 2008: they will decrease, as service is expanded and offers are multiplied. We shall have to wait.

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After the news about ETECSA’s new service came out, Progreso Weekly asked some friends on the Web for their first impressions about the offer. Here they are:

Amado del Pino, Cuban journalist and dramatist, living in Spain

[Internet access] is expensive and almost exclusionist in terms of navigation, but the option for international e-mail is in line with the prices that (at least in Havana) people pay at farmers’ markets or for transportation. It is expensive but in line with people’s real lives, real lives that go beyond the monthly wages of $18, often cited by the foreign press. Outsiders ignore the fact that the rent, telephone, water and light bills are still paid in Cuban pesos. In sum, this measure cheers me up.

Yohandry Fontana, Cuban blogger (http://www.yohandry.com)

It is a first step – necessary and demanded by the population – that will enable thousands of Cubans to enter right into the Web. This is an important step forward, especially for a country with a high standard of education, where everyone can read and write, a country that needs to access reliable sources of information and development.

I think the price is high, but things will ease up, just like they did with cell phones. [Internet access] is also going through an economic stage. Every investment of its type has to go through the stage of technology and for Cuba, on occasion, technological access becomes difficult and very expensive.

The next step may be related to WiFi zones, which (I know for a fact) are available at some universities, and the connections from home. It is estimated that more than 300,000 computers are in private hands in Cuba, terminals that are practically idle; they’re used to play games, process text, etc., nothing involving the Web.

This technology just lies there, asleep, but can be incorporated at one blow to the country’s development. Add to this the fact that about 100 computers arrive in Cuba every week from the United States. This is leading-edge technology in which Cuba spends not a cent, technology that can be incorporated quickly into the Web from anywhere on the island.

Roberto Suárez, Cuban photo-journalist for Juventud Rebelde

It is a positive measure. Many of us Cubans had been waiting for it. Now the authorities will have to expand the service and lower the prices. [Internet access] is too expensive for the existing salaries.

Rolando Almirante, filmmaker

To expand the possibilities of public access to the Internet in a country like Cuba, where the possibilities of cyberspace use have been ruled by material and economic conditions and the priority to research sectors with direct implication in the socio-economic life of the country is, without a doubt, a step forward. Despite the technological challenges that Cuban society faces, people have demonstrated skills and savvy to interact with a computerized world. I am sure that [Internet access] will foster not only communication among people but also the awareness and visibility of diverse social actors.

Carlos Alberto Pérez, Cuban blogger (http://www.chiringadecuba.com)

This is, without a doubt, a historic day for all of us Cubans, because finally we witness the true technological development that we had awaited for so long, whether it is for leisure and personal enjoyment or for the country’s social and economic development. True, the rates just announced are, for the time being, extremely high, because no ordinary Cuban who lives from his wages can ever hope to access the Internet for 4.50 CUC per hour. That’s more than a day’s wages for me. Maybe, sometime in the future, I might pay that much for a week’s usage, but that doesn’t mean I could afford the other three weeks of the month.

I hope that, little by little, as has happened with cell-phone telephony, this service will offer more facilities and the prices will drop. We accomplish nothing by setting up this service nationwide, while the citizens are financially unable to put it to good use.

Progreso Semanal/ Weekly authorizes the total or partial reproduction of the articles by our journalists so long as source and author are identified.