World Telecommunication Day 1999 |
The expansion of wireless telephone communications in the Middle East and North Africa is being accompanied by a proliferation of new television and radio channels beamed to the region via satellite. Viewers are welcoming the wider choice of international news and information, just as they are lining up to take advantage of the state-of-the-art mobile connections that a host of new private companies are now providing.
Arianespace, based in Evry, near Paris, launched Arabsat 3A in February 1999, the fifth satellite it has sent into space for the Arab League organization. The latest version, which was manufactured by the Toulouse-based Alcatel Space, weighed 6,000 pounds (2,727 kilograms) and carried 20 KU-band transponders as well as others for telephony, fax and data. The satellite will allow direct-to-home broadcast transmissions across a wide footpath stretching from Europe and North Africa to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states.
In April 1998, Arianespace placed Nilesat 101 into orbit for the Egyptian Television and Broadcasting Union (ETBU). Equipped with 12 KU-band transponders, it will provide up to 100 digital television channels, also for direct-to-home delivery. The French company is now planning to launch a second satellite, Nilesat 102, for the ETBU in the middle of next year.
Throughout the Middle East and North Africa, viewers previously accustomed to anodyne terrestrial broadcasts from state-owned companies are installing satellite dishes to take up the new channels, both free and subscription-based, because of their more open broadcasting policies. Aside from the Egyptian and Arabsat offerings, satellite transmissions are carried by the Rome-based Orbit Communications, the Jeddah-based Arab Radio and Television (ART) and the London-based Middle East Broadcasting Center (MBC). Two Lebanese stations - LBC and Future - also beam transmissions to the Gulf and Levantine area via satellite, as does Al-Jazeera in Qatar and Emirates Dubai Television (EDTV) in the United Arab Emirates.
On the ground, news teams and outside broadcast services in the region are heralding new advances in both equipment and transmission services that will make their job easier. London-based Inmarsat has unveiled a new mobile ISDN service in association with Livewire Digital, a leading company in news-gathering technology. The portable Inmarsat satellite terminal weighs just nine pounds, while Livewire's package, set in a Sony VAIO PC, incorporates DV video technology for nonlinear editing and MPEG encoding. Together, they allow journalists in the field to transmit still or video pictures using equipment that fits into a shoulder bag.
Pamela Ann Smith