Good call minister ... now for action

THE assurance of Communications Minister Eamon Ryan that the broadband service to rural regions is to be improved is good news for farmers, who are urged to do more online business with the Department of Agriculture and other services. But it has been a case of wait and wait.

The minister has promised broadband services in all rural areas by 2010, and higher speeds by 2012, which are available in most European countries already.

Until then, it remains difficult to get a decent service at a reasonable cost in many rural areas. A lot of what is available is of poor quality, frequently because of high contention ratios on the fixed line services, and because of the poor quality of lines provided by eircom. You don’t have to go very far to observe the poor condition of the phone lines. Inside these cables, there are more problems which affect broadband quality. Many users of internet and e-mail services via eircom lines experience a high ratio of connection breakdown.