Guyana leading in 5G implementation – President Ali

Guyana has become one of the first nations in the region to have effectively rolled out 5G technology.

Paving the way for an increased demand for the internet, Guyana is already leading the region in laying down a higher amount of fibre optic cables nationwide.

This is according to President, Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali, as he addressed a special session of Parliament on Thursday, at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre (ACCC), Liliendaal.

The Fifth generation of mobile networking – 5G – offers higher upload and download speeds, more consistent connections and improved capacity.

“Guyana is one of the first Caribbean countries to deploy 5G technology. These are accomplishments [that] we should be proud of. These are accomplishments that we earned through hard work and sound policy making,” President Ali said.

He also highlighted that the government has built and operationalised 121 ICT hubs in the hinterland with another 26 in progress.

Additionally, President Ali boasted of the robust digital technology infrastructure Guyana possesses.

“We have one of the most aggressive and transformative digital economies in the world today. The level of aggression in which we are pursuing the digital opportunity is second to none,” President Ali posited.

Meanwhile, this new networking standard could not have been possible without the liberalisation of the telecommunications sector.

“Within the first weeks of government, we have liberalised the telecommunications sector and removed VAT on data, resulting in the cost of dedicated bandwidth decreasing by 55 per cent,” the president said.