For developing countries, digital broadcasting migration is yet another issue in a long list of challenges. In a new report written by Coura Fall for APC, the ICT (information and communication technology) expert explains that the transition presents more than economic challenges. Social challenges must also be taken into account.

APC condemns the imprisonment of Alaa Abd El-Fattah, an influential Egyptian activist and blogger and long-time APC collaborator, for his conscientious objection to the use of military courts to try civilians in Egypt.

Nigeria has been ahead of the game when it comes to digital broadcast migration, and has set itself the bold target of completing the migration by June 2012. But a new report by APC reveals that things are not moving because the policy framework still has not been approved, meaning that Nigeria will not likely meet its target.

As West Africa’s fifteen countries migrate to digital TV by 2015, the people responsible for the change-over in Ghana have been struggling to determine which technology to use. Meanwhile the process hasn’t developed much and most Ghanaians have not been informed of this upcoming migration, says the author of new research carried out for APC.

The 7th edition of APC member SANGONeT’s ICT4RD 2011 confronts the realities of rural development and explores the innovative use of ICTs to catalyse the growth of ICT4RD solutions for scale from November 1-3.

“We have the skills, the entrepreneurs, a spectrum model we can replicate, the standards, the technology and clearly we have the demand” said South African Henk Kleynhans in the wake of a TV white spaces workshop in Johannesburg last week. “All we need is a regulatory go-ahead.”