A workshop of Caribbean telecom regulators next week in Ocho Rios...

Exec. Dir. Clovis Baptista said Mon. Inter- American Proposals (IAPs) for the conference June 9-July 4 will be vetted among policymakers from 15 Caribbean administrations, Baptista told us. “IAP common proposals could receive strong support from other countries,” he said. IAPs are finalized if they are supported by at least 6 administrations and when there is opposition, if it’s less than or equal to 50% of the number of countries that support a proposal. The scope of the agenda for this year’s WRC is a concern, particularly for developing nations with limited resources, Baptista said. This year’s agenda has 44 items, compared with 11 in 1997. “It’s a concern of everybody’s because the huge amount of items to be addressed is unbelievable,” he said. He said CITEL as well as other regional organizations, in response to this agenda’s size, “did a much better job of anticipating coordination with other participants.” IAP common proposals were finalized in Feb. at a meeting in Orlando. Baptista said that the large number of agenda items posed particular challenges for developing countries that had difficulty putting resources into the WRC preparatory process in each region. Caribbean nations often have very few people working exclusively on telecom and spectrum policy issues, which makes WRC preparations a challenge, he said. Next week’s workshop, to be held in conjunction with the ITU-Development sector, is important in part because it could receive more support for CITEL IAPs that already have backing from a significant number of that group’s 34 administrations, Baptista said. CITEL said IAP drafts that didn’t receive clear-cut support at the Feb. meeting included a proposal on agenda item 1.24. That proposal would have the conference review usage of 13.75-14 GHz in line with developments at WRC 2000, when nongeostationary orbit (NGSO) fixed satellite service earth station transmitters in the band created a potential sharing issue with the space research service. Some satellite companies are interested in easing antenna size for broader deployment of broadband applications without causing interference to military radar. CITEL said one reason a common IAP didn’t emerge on that item was because there were 2 opposing proposals. CITEL members agreed to continue to circulate preliminary proposals on that and a 2nd agenda item, 1.38, for which similar competing proposals were making the rounds. Agenda item 1.38 would consider providing up to 6 MHz to the earth exploration satellite service in the 420- 470 MHz band.