Telecommunication Infrastructure
Telecommunication Infrastructure
Telecommunication Infrastructure
According to the World Bank Development Report, El Salvador is one of the more liberlized telecommunications markets in Central America and contains a teledensity rate of more than 10%. The economy has steadily improved with the end of the civil war and the recovery from a major earthquake in 1986.
In 1996 the government of El Salvador introduced legislation that resulted in the liberalization and sale of the state owned telecom ANTEL in July 1998. ANTEL was divided into the Compania de Telecomunicaciones de El Salvador (CTE), which is primarily a wireline company and Internacional de Telecomunicaciones (INTEL), which is promarily a wireless company. CTE was sold to France Telecom (FT) and INTEL was sold to Telefonica de Espana.
The Superintendency General for Electricity and Telecommunications (SIGET) was established in 1996 as the telcom regulatory authority. SIGET requires all local servie providers to gove access to their networks for other services, including data, long distance, cellular and other wireless.
Investment in the telecom sector has seen stready growth
especially in the introduction and penetration of fibre and mobile lines.
CTE planned to add 100,000 fixed and mobile lines in 2000 as well as four
provincial fibreoptic lines in 2001. Overall, they were expected
to invest over US$110 million in new lines and rural penetration.
Source: US Department of Commerce-International
Trade Administration
Wireless
Opportunities should be available for U.S. telecommunications equipment manufacturers as INTEL, CTE and Telemovil (a private cellular provider) plan to build out and expand their networks. Other wireless carriers that have entered the market recently include Telefonica, Digicel (from Venezuela) and Central American Communications (also known as Oceanic American Digital Communications). Due to rapid gains in market share, Telefonica is likely to become El Salvador's largest wireless carrier.
SIGET announced plans to auction off 3G spectrum licenses
within the next 2 to 3 years, but not until the market was ready and service
providers had committed to providing the next-generation services.
At the moment, some 2.5G services are available which include SMS and other
Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) applications.
Source: US Department of Commerce-International
Trade Administration
Diffusion of Networks
Network services for businesses are provided primarily
by Infrastructura Salvadorena de Telecommunicaciones (Insatelsa), which
is a joint venture between American investors and Banco Capital.
A 15 year contract is in place with CTE to use the existing backbone for
its own digital network. Competition in this sector has come from
Telefonica, which has begun laying an IP backbone in hopes of capturing
the advanced services market.
Source: US Department of Commerce-International
Trade Administration
Tariffs
There are no major tariffs or non-tariff barriers to the
importation of telecommunications equipment. Tariffs do exist on
finished telecommunications equipment from countries that do not participate
in the Central American Common Market. These tariffs are approximately
15 percent, while tariffs on capital goods are virtually zero. There
are no requirements to have a local partner in most telecommunications
sub-sectors. There are also no restrictions on remittance of profits.
Source: US Department of Commerce-International
Trade Administration
| Communications in El Salvador | |
| Telephones - | Main lines in use: 380,000 (1998) |
| Telephones - | Mobile cellular: 40,163 (1997) |
| Telephone system general assessment: | NA |
| Telephone system domestic: | Nationwide microwave radio relay system |
| Telephone system international: | Satellite earth station - 1 Intelsat (Atlantic Ocean); connected to Central American Microwave System |
| Radio broadcast stations: | AM 61 (plus 24 repeaters), FM 30, shortwave 0 (1998) |
| Radios: | 2.75 million (1997) |
| Television broadcast stations: | 5 (1997) |
| Televisions: | 600,000 (1990) |
| Internet country code: | .sv |
| Internet Service Providers (ISPs): | 4 (2000) |
| Internet users: | 40,000 (2000) |