1. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 1 ACP Dany Vandromme & George McLaughlin

2. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 2 Specific Objective of the Assessment Study  to examine the relevance and viability of establishing or enhancing National Research and Education Networks (NRENs) in the Pacific Region  and/or the implementation of a Regional Research and Education Network (RREN),  as well as identifying potential beneficiary institutions and other stakeholders.

3. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 3 Who initiated the Study  The European Commission - on behalf of the Pacific Region of the African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) Group of States within the framework of the 10 th EDF* Intra-ACP Development Cooperation ACP Connect for Research and Education Networks Programme  * = European Development Fund

4. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 4 Why?  Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific Islands are the most underserved parts of the world, particularly with respect to affordable high-speed telecommunications infrastructure, and exploiting that infrastructure to improve education, health, societal benefit and research outcomes. REN initiatives are well advanced now in Africa and the Caribbean, but much less so among most of the Pacific Islands.

5. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 5 Undersea Cable Deployment - the underserved  As of mid-2012, only 21 nations and territories remain isolated from fibre optic connectivity, though projects are underway in many of these markets at the time of writing ( Submarine Cable Industry Report, Issue 1, July 2012, Submarine Telecoms Forum, Inc.)  The Pacific Island Nations and Territories together with Timor Leste account for more than half of these

6. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 6 Much Interest in addressing these issues for the Pacific Islands  World Bank; Asian Development Bank;  AusAID; NZAID, JICA, ITU, UNESCO  Asia Pacific Telecommunity  Pacific Islands Telecommunications Association  ACP Group of States, EC  U Hawaii; NSRC, NSF  Pacific Telecommunications Council  Pacific ICT Regulatory Resource Centre  New players and partners of influence

7. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study TARGET COUNTRIES for this Study A number of Pacific Island Countries consist of many islands The region spans 6 different time zones Largest population more than 6 million (PNG), smallest just over 1,000 (Niue) Recent political challenges in some Critical survival conditions for others (eg Kiribati due to threat of sea level rise) low priority of REN issues relative to other pressing social and environmental needs

8. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 8 ACP Pacific Country GDP PPP per capita Ranking Population (2011 Est.) Internet Usage as at 31 Dec 2011 % Population (Penetration) RENCable LandingTo Papua New Guinea 1506,187,591 125,000 2.00% PNG- ARNet APNG-2 PPC-1 Australia & Guamactive East Timor1431,177,833 2,361 0.20%SoI Asia Fiji129833,125 162,880 18.40%USP-Net SCCN ICN Tonga Cable AU & Hawaii Vanuatu Tonga active 2013 2013 Solomon Islands 138571,890 26,907 4.70%USP-NetSOC to PPC-1Guam2013 Vanuatu125224,564 19,172 8.50%USP-NetICNFiji2013 Samoa113193,161 12,816 6.60%USP-NetSAS Am Samoa Hawaii active Micronesia156106,836 22,213 20.80% HANTRU1Guamactive Tonga104105,916 12,487 11.80%USP-NetTonga CableFiji2013 Kiribati111100,743 8,959 8.90%USP-Net Marshall Islands 14967,182 6,540 9.70%USP-NetHANTRU1Guamactive Palua10020,956 5,980 28.50% foreshadowedGuam2014 Cook Islands 11,124 6,000 53.90%USP-Net Tuvalu13710,544 4,300 40.80%USP-Net Nauru1249,322 340 3.60%USP-Net Niue 1,311 1,100 83.90%USP-Net Pacific 9,622,098417,055 4.33%

9. 9 ACP Pacific Country Higher Education, Technical and Vocational Education Institutions (more than 50 institutions) Cook Islands USP East Timor Universidade Nacional de Timor-Leste plus 9 others Fiji USP; Fiji National University; University of Fiji Kiribati USP; Institute of Technology; Fisheries Training Centre; Marine Training Centre; School of Nursing; Teachers College Marshall Islands USP; College of the Marshall Islands Nauru USP Niue USP Papau New Guinea Uni of PNG; Uni of Technology; Uni of Natural Environment & Resources; Uni of Goroka; Divine Word Uni; Pacific Adventist Uni; Don Bosco Technological Institute; Institute of Business Studies; National Polytechnic Institute; plus 3 technical colleges and 3 business colleges Samoa USP; National University of Samoa Solomon Islands USP; Solomon Islands College of Higher Education Tonga USP; Institute of Education; Institute of Higher Education ; Institute of Science and Technology; Tupou Tertiary Institute; Pouono Technical Institute; Health Training Centre ; Queen Salote School of Nursing Tuvalu USP; Maritime Training Institute Vanuatu USP; Institute of Technology; College of Nursing; Agriculture College; Institute of Teacher Education; Maritime College; Fisheries Centre

10. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study New submarine cable infrastructure 11/05/2102 10 Solomons Yap Palau Current and Planned Cable Systems in the Pacific Island Region

11. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Established 1968 12 member countries Multi owned and multi funded 33million Sq Km ocean USP SERVING THE PACIFIC ISLAND COUNTRIES

12. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 12

13. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 13 CONCEPTUAL REN

14. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Global view

15. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 15 Opportunities as part of the global NREN community  Immediate access to massive teaching and learning resources  Opportunity to participate in regional and global collaborations  Societal benefit  Improving lives as a result of implementing advanced communications that support the well-being of the population (eg access to expertise 1000’s of km away, disaster warning and mitigation) - examples  Catalysing and stimulating the information economy  Providing services to transform business, society, and personal lives.  Implementing collaborative innovation and access to information  Acting as incubator for technology transfer to industry and commerce

16. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study 16 Research vs Societal Benefit agenda  Good networking can vastly improve societal benefit  When combined with a research agenda eg  earthquake modeling/prediction  climate change research  remote immersive diagnostic systems for patient assessment  bioinformatics research to improve response and mitigation of emerging infections a compelling case may result  Drivers depend on the needs of the country concerned and the ability to support the initiatives

17. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Structure of the Study (1)  Inception Report  Desk Study  Field Phase  Synthesis phase 17

18. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Structure of the Study (2)  More than 70 individual contributors (mainly face-to face)  Contributions from more than 40 organisations  Compilation and analysis of relevant studies already undertaken  Assessment of the Regulatory Environment  Identification of the Education and Research Requirements  Identification of potential user Institutions of a Pacific REN 18

19. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Findings, Roadmap, Awareness Raising  Deficiencies in Information Exchange between R&E Institutions and between relevant Ministries  Limited extent of current R&E Networking among the target countries of the Study  Factors to address for enhanced uptake of undersea cable capacity  Regional initiatives, potential synergies and potential sources of funding  Development of a Roadmap and Awareness Raising 19

20. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Observations  Mostly, among the ACP Pacific Target countries, education, human capacity building and societal benefit have higher priority than research  High costs for local and international telecommunication infrastructures and services are a significant obstacle  Insufficient understanding for R&E traffic and consequences in terms of peering and funding agreements  In those target countries where the pricepoint of mobile broadband (3G) is affordable, significant transformation is already occurring – well suited to Pacific Island situatiions where fixed instrastructure deployment has challenges.

21. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study R&E landscape  All target countries recognise the importance of ICT and Internet access to support Education, at all levels (from primary to tertiary).  In addition to USP, more than 40 other post-secondary/tertiary institutions are located in the PICs, which may be part of the membership base of a Pacific regional REN (PacREN)  University of South Pacific is a regionally based institution with campuses in 12 PICs. It is an almost unique arrangement of being like a Regional REN, but for a single institution. But there is no NREN in Fiji, ie USP’s main campus in Suva doesn’t network interconnect with the National University of the University of Fiji over shared infrastructure.

22. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study National infrastructures  Only PNG has something approaching an NREN (PNG-Arnet), which is organised as a satellite service, of which the hub station is located in Singapore.  It is complemented by a 10 Mbps leased line (on PPC-1) to access the commercial Internet in Sydney.  At the national level, the R&E institutions consensus has still to be enhanced  There is no arrangement for R&E traffic exchanges with other PICs, nor with TEIN nor AARNet  PNG has two significantly underutilised cable systems (one to Australia and one to both Australia and Guam)

23. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Regional initiatives  AusAID (Australia): Pacific Tertiary Education Strategy 2020 (funding: $85 Million over 4 years) to improve access to tertiary education in a number of PICs, including the establishment of a Pacific Regional Research and Education Network  Univesity of Hawaii, NSRC and the US-NSF EAGER Award to engage R&E community and other stakeholders for research networking in the PICs.

24. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Regional initiatives  UNESCO CONNECT-Asia initiative and School on the Internet (SoI), with support of Japan’s WIDE program and a number of APAN Members. UNTL (Timor Leste) is involved both with Connect-Asia and SoI.  ACP-Connect study was introduced at the last Connect-Asia meeting in Jakarta (July 2012) with UNESCO, SoI and APAN expressing willingness to help.

25. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Roadmap: National level  Three possible scenarios are proposed to match all the possible PIC configurations:  Standard NREN (A)  Shared resources for Education (B)  Internet only (C)

26. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Roadmap: National level 26

27. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Roadmap: Regional level 27

28. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Roadmap: Regional level  A mix of submarine cables circuits and satellite services is proposed.  It supposes that non-ACP countries will be allowed to participate (and contribute) as non-beneficiaries (much like in the TEIN setup).  A core ring between Guam, PNG, Sydney, Fiji and Hawaii, complemented with cable circuits to Tonga, Vanuatu, Solomons, Samoa, Palau, Marshalls and Micronesia, and satellite services. 28

29. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Roadmap: Regional level  Proposed governance is a regional organisation, similar to the USP setup, of which the country representatives should be the NRENs (A or B types).  C type countries will be invited to join at the time they will migrate from C to B or A…  Significant effort is needed to explain the benefit and cost efficiency of distinguishing R&E traffic from commercial Internet, justifying dedicated circuits on submarine cables. 29

30. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Roadmap: Connectivity to global R&E  R&E access to I2/NLR/CANARIE, TEIN, SINET, APAN Members, GEANT through Guam, Hawaii - and AARNet, REANNZ through Sydney  Satellite hub(s) will need also to provide direct R&E peerings (TEIN and WIDE in Singapore or Hong Kong, O3B in Hawaii)  Transit negotiations with AARNet, TEIN, I2/NLR, APAN Members, etc. will need to be undertaken at the PacREN level 30

31. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study RECOMMENDATIONS 31 Twelve recommendations sorted into three groups are proposed: Architecture : R1 to R3 Regional Cooperation : R4 to R9 Awareness Raising : R10 to R12

32. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study ARCHITECTURE: Recommendation #1  Promote the need of a NREN strategy in all ACP countries, as a tool for improving the R&E sector and a requirement to participate to any regional network initiative 32

33. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study ARCHITECTURE: Recommendation #2  Ensure the ACP countries validate and support the PacREN regional network principle, strategy and architecture.  ACP secretariat, together with the EC will need to play a significant role through the broad awareness recommendation 33

34. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study ARCHITECTURE: Recommendation #3  Consider mobile broadband penetration as a key support mechanism to reach R&E users where fixed infrastructure deployment has challenges.  Take advantage of new paradigms like cloud-based services to concentrate on fundamental network functions not available on the market (eg net+ services) 34

35. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study REGIONAL COOPERATION: Recommendations #4, #5, #6 and #7  Cooperation with AusAID, and engagement with their 2020 strategy (noting that AusAID’s strategy does not include all ACP countries)  Cooperation with University of Hawaii and NSRC for the US-NFS funded EAGER study (Guam and Hawaii should play key roles as hubs of a PacREN)  Cooperation with JICA and USP in the adaptation of the satellite components of USP-Net to the new cable availabilities to concentrate on pure satellite services for off-cable PICs. Interconnect with Japan via cables from Hawaii or Guam  Cooperation with the education delivery programs of UNESCO, SoI and the World Bank’s Global Development Learning Program 35

36. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study  Cooperation with Asian Development Bank and the World Bank (focus on economic development) which are key actors for new cable deployment (Tonga, Vanuatu, Solomons, etc.). - R&E may act as catalyst or even early adopters of cable infrastructure. 36 REGIONAL COOPERATION: Recommendation #8

37. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study  Cooperation with SPC ( to be replaced ), PICs and PIRRC, which may be key players for the administrative, governance & regulatory issues of PacREN. They may also play a key role in the broad awareness raising process. 37 REGIONAL COOPERATION: Recommendation #9

38. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study AWARENESS RAISING: Recommendation #10, #11 and #12  Awareness raising of the R&E user community at the local and national levels.  Awareness raising of governments and ministries  Awareness campaign through workshops/seminars in order to enhance in a coordinated way, the sensitivity to NREN/RREN issues in all possible fora such as telecommunication conferences (like PITA or PTC), R&E events etc. 38

39. ACP CONNECT Pacific Assessment Study Conclusions  During the four phases of the assessment study, major challenges were identified, including.  Limited economic power  Limited awareness of R&E networking  High telecommunication costs and limited cable footprint  A roadmap is proposed, based on  NREN stage (A, B and C types are possible)  RREN stage (PacREN) made of a cable circuit core infrastructure, complemented with satellite services for sparsely distributed PICs (off-cable countries)  Vigourous awareness raising action is required to support both previous stages 39