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Delegation from India studies Nunavut expertise

It may come as a bit of a surprise, but Nunavut is a global leader in telecommunications

PATRICIA D’SOUZA

It was about 10 C last Tuesday in Iqaluit. And it was 40 C in Delhi, the capital of India. Yet, four Indian government officials who stepped off a plane for a whirlwind tour of the Nunavut capital were drawn by the similarities the two cities share.

Iqaluit was the second stop on a 21-day trade mission that will eventually take the delegation from India’s department of telecommunications to Toronto, Edmonton and Vancouver. But according to Aaron Baillie, the Industry Canada business development officer who organized the trip, the group stands the most to learn from Nunavut.

"A lot of the challenges faced here are similar to the challenges faced in India," Baillie said. In addition to the extreme climate, the two regions share sparse population patterns, in which more than 80 per cent of people live in villages as opposed to big cities.

There’s also the rugged terrain — desert and mountains — that separates villages, and a low literacy rate. "Trying to teach computer technology to people who can’t read is not as easy as it may sound," he said.

The other significant similarity is the two regions’ strong reliance on satellite technology. Much of India’s telecommunications infrastructure has been provided by Canadian firms. And Baillie’s mission is to entice them to buy more.

Industry Canada manages a $4.5-million fund on behalf of CIDA, the Canadian International Development Agency, and the Canadian tour was arranged to expose the Indian delegation to Canadian telecommunications innovation.

Nunavut was at the top of their list

"We’re a bit of a global leader," said Alison Rogan, manager of training information and partnerships for Nunavut’s department of sustainable development. "We don’t talk a lot about our accomplishments."

Exchange of ideas

Two days of PowerPoint presentations gave the delegates ample time to absorb the details of Nunavut’s accomplishments.

However, it didn’t leave much time for berry-picking or camping by the causeway. The four government officials, S.K. Malhotra, H.K. Gupta, N.K. Gupta and G.S. Raju, spent most of their time in the darkened Nanuq boardroom on the second floor of the Nunavut legislature.

Their goal was to learn as much as possible about Nunavut’s information and communications technology, and, they admitted, to take back information that may help India avoid some of the pitfalls that the Nunavut has experienced.

"We’re a developing country. We’ll go back with experience, rather than learning from our own experience," Malhotra said.

They sat patiently through explanations of the Ardicom Network, the Nunavut Broadband Task Force and Nunavut’s emerging Telehealth system.

The Telehealth discussion proved less an opportunity for learning than commiseration. India faces the same recruitment challenges in small communities that Nunavut does, Malhotra said. "We have literally to force people to go there."

The meeting became a true exchange of ideas when the delegates began to talk about India’s satellite expertise.

The technology that Nunavut uses costs in the range of $65 million. "We could do it for one-tenth the price," Raju said. "The best thing India could do is to give them a satellite."

"We would love one," said Jag Narasimhadevara, manager of IT systems development for the GN.

The Canadian satellite monopoly

Nunavut’s 26 communities rely entirely on satellite technology for communication. Decentralization has only strengthened the dependence on it.

However, the biggest barrier to communication in Nunavut is the cost of bandwidth. As a result, most communities in the territory use outdated connections as slow as 64K.

Satellite service is a monopoly in Canada, owned and controlled by Telesat Canada, which, in turn, is owned by the giant BCE Inc., which owns NorthwesTel. While there have been several attempts in years past to break the monopoly, those attempts have never succeeded.

But in the small Nanuq boardroom, the group of GN and Indian government officials hatched a plan.

"The government of India has lots of experience launching satellites. They have developed and launched their own satellites," Narasimhadevara said.

"We could launch a satellite for a much cheaper price than I ever thought possible. Perhaps it’s possible to have our own satellite."

It’s an idea that must be researched further, he said. "The GN should visit [India] and see how they do things. Canada has a lot to offer India. If there are any trade missions going to India — as there were a couple of years ago — maybe the GN should go."

The Internet as a "global commons"

The meetings ran long, as meetings are wont to do, and so there wasn’t much time left for sightseeing. However, the group did manage to fit in a visit to Iqaluit’s community access program (CAP) at the Iqaluit public library.

CAP is a federal initiative meant to provide Canadians with public access to the Internet. Iqaluit’s site, called Nuluaq, or net, is made up of six computers, a server and a printer.

The concept is relatively new in Canada; it began in 1994 — and unheard of in India. But the delegation seemed entranced by the presentation, and eager to learn how it all came together.

Like inexpensive satellites in Nunavut airspace, there is really no reason public access to the Internet can’t work in India.

"Just as Aboriginal societies conceive of the land as a collective good, public policies should support the notion of the Internet as a ‘global commons,’" said Dushyenth Ganesan, manager of trade and export development for the GN, in a presentation to the delegates.

Of course, even Nunavut hasn’t come quite that far yet.

According to NorthwesTel, basic service in the high-cost northern serving area consists of single-line touch-tone phone service, access to an operator and directory assistance, access to a long-distance network and a copy of the current telephone directory. Internet isn’t even on the list.

And until it is, Nunavut may be much more like a developing country than the territorial or federal governments care to believe.

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