Tonga is seeking a US$26.9 million grant from the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank to support the installation of a broadband cable network for Tonga next year.

The Tongan Prime Minister Lord Tu'ivakano met the President of the World Bank Group, Mr Robert B. Zoellick in Sydney yesterday, 15 August. Lord Tu’ivakano will also meet the ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda, who will visit Australia later this week, and a decision on the grants is expected before the end of this month, August.

A broadband high-speed internet cable network for Tonga will cost US$34 million, but a favourable decision by the World Bank and and the ADB at the end of this month would facilitate the project with grants of US$17.2 million from the World Bank and US$9.7 million from the ADB. The Tongan government would pay the project balance of $7.1 million.

The project has been scheduled to go before ADB’s Board of Directors for consideration on August 23 and to the World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors on August 30, 2011.

The ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda said that the underwater fiberoptic cable would connect Tonga to the Southern Cross Cable," the main trans-Pacific link between Australia and the United States and it would connect Tonga firmly with the rest of the world, generating huge economic opportunities from early 2013 when the cable should be in place and marking a key step in Tonga’s international connectivity."

Robert B. Zoellick said that having access to high-speed internet links would improve the opportunities for the people of Tonga to connect to the world, "provide information needed by business to expand jobs, and allow people to more easily and inexpensively keep in contact with families overseas. It will also make it easier for Tongans living abroad to remit money home – critically important as remittances comprise about a third of GDP."

The high-speed internet connection for Tonga will build on the successful telecommunications reform over the past five years in the country, which has resulted in a six-fold increase in mobile phone coverage in the same period. Market opening and the introduction of new private sector service providers, along with financing from the World Bank’s private sector arm, IFC, have helped increase mobile phone coverage rates from less than 10% to over 60% of the population.

"I am pleased that the World Bank Group and ADB are significantly boosting support for Tonga, and across the Pacific islands more generally," said Tongan Prime Minister Lord Tu’ivakano.