More Telecom Coverage.

Telecom coverage is now available along the 701km-long NH-10 and NH-25 covering Lasbela, Awaran, Gwadar and Kech. Work has also been nearly completed on the provision of telecom services along the 650km NH-25 and NH-65 passing through the areas of Lasbela, Khuzdar, Mustung, Kalat, Quetta, Jaffarabad, Nasirabad and Sibi districts.

A project to extend the services along the 450km NH-50 and NH-70 passing through Pishin, Qilla Saifullah, Zhob, Sherani, Loralai, Musakhel and Barkhan districts is also to be completed soon. These exciting developments were revealed on Tuesday at a briefing about progress over the past three years on projects to provide telecom coverage in unserved patches of the national highways (NH) and motorways (M), held by the Minister for Information Technology and Telecom.

This is a great step. Providing good telecom coverage, particularly to more rural areas with rougher terrain is a job that even developed states struggle with, having to nationalise most telecommunications or delivery services. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown just how important connectivity and internet...