United State Agency for International Development (USAID) and Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) have just signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to co-sponsor a pilot project of providing wireless internet (WiFi) to three rural remote communes in central Vietnam’s Quang Ngai Province.
As the MoU goes, the project is to be co-ordinated by Viet Nam Electricity and US' s partners of the World Resources Institute, SRA, Solitech and Intel. The parties have agreed to develop a WiFi mesh-based community broadband network built off of EVN’s fiber network in three communes and to provide 300 VoIP phones and services applications for public and private use in local communities.
According to US representative, Dennis Zvinakis, the project to provide low-cost telephone and wireless broad and internet services aims at improving the economic and social well-being of Vietnamese, now and days to come. He said: "Our public-private partnership shares a joint vision with the Government of Viet Nam that every person, family and community in Viet Nam – no matter where they are located or how far away they are from urban centres – can connect with the international ‘knowledge economy’ in ways that uplift their lives and prospects for the future,"
Also as said by Dennis Zvinakis, the project builds on USAID’s "Last Mile" Initiative in the northern Lao Cai Province which co-ordinated by the US firm’s technology and Vietnamese communications enterprises to extend the benefits of advanced wireless broadband connectivity to remote areas of Viet Nam.
The project will start by July and complete in December 2007.
Minh Chau
