Telecommunications sector reform

Once a government is persuaded that encouraging new service suppliers is more likely to close the gap between demand and supply than maintaining the status quo, hard choices must be made about where to start and how to proceed. By and large, governments should adopt a "serve it or lose it" policy to require carriers to meet the paid demand for new service within a given time or face the prospect of having a competing company licensed to provide service or having portions of their service territory refranchized to other carriers. Regulation has been the weakest part of sector reform in poorer countries. If this deficiency is not addressed, ambitious plans for expansion are likely to be compromised. Effective regulation is important for attracting substantial amounts of private capital to telecommunications.<>