San Simon town, pilot area for digital broadcast shift
SAN SIMON - This fourth district municipality was the pilot testing area in Pampanga for a signal check in line with impending mandatory shift from analog to digital terrestrial television broadcast (DTTB).
The National Telecommunications Commission Region III (NTC-3) together with the Japan Ministry of Information and Communication held the signal testing activity in the Barangay Concepcion portion of San Simon-Baliwag national road recently.
In 2013, then President Benigno Aquino III announced the country’s migration to digital TV broadcasting using the Japanese standard Integrated Service Digital Broadcasting-Terrestrial (ISDB-T) to provide better frequencies to Filipino viewers.
NTC-3 Regional Director Azor Sitchon said that the testing aims to evaluate the signal strength in the area and its capability to receive digital signal from Metro Manila to the testing area and its vicinity.
He stressed that that the NTC has been conducting signal test in other parts of the country, particularly on remote areas, to ensure the smooth transition from analog to digital broadcasting ahead of its target complete roll-out in 2023.
“This is one of the preparatory measures that we are conducting all over the country to ensure that there is sufficient digital signal that can smoothly accommodate the shift to DTTB. Hopefully by 2023, we can finally implement the program,” he said.
Japan Ministry of Information and Communication Consultant Engineer James Santiago said that the signal testing will also be instrumental in formulating the overall digital footprint of the country.
“I was informed that there is already a digital signal transmitter in the City of San Fernando so we are going to detect how much of the signal reaches this area. We are also gonna verify if digital signal from Baguio reaches here so we can conduct adjustments if needed,” he said.
Santiago said that if signal test detects interference or insufficiency of digital signal, the NTC will have to advise concerned operators to comply with the signal necessity in the area which they agreed to do on documents, otherwise they will be subject to certain penalties.
“This will actually be beneficial in this area because they would be assured of a good quality of digital TV signal once the transition will be in full effect years from now,” he said.