My choice of title for this month’s column is but a mirror to the complexities of what is to many, but certainly not to all, the rather remote topic of satellite regulation. If perhaps rather obscure, satellite regulation is something we certainly cannot do without; utter chaos would follow from its absence.
GVF is now twenty-five years-old. Born in 1997 and registered as a not-for-profit, limited by guarantee, company in London, where its headquarters remain, GVF is a quite different animal twenty-five years on, but its original primary brief to tackle regulatory matters resoundingly continues to this day.
For that quarter century GVF has been the sole global trade association of the entire satellite communications ecosystem – space segment
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| After 25 years, the GVF's original primary brief to tackle regulatory matters resoundingly continues to this day. (image courtesy of the ITU) |
AND ground segment – and this unique status remains unchanged. Throughout, GVF has advocated and lobbied on behalf of the satellite communications industry before the ITU, regional regulatory bodies, and national regulators. We have brought to the up-close attention of the global regulatory community an understanding of all that the satellite industry brings to humanity’s need for better communications solutions, often right to their collective doorstep, as with the November-December 2018 workshop delivered by GVF and its members adjunct to the World Radiocommunication Seminar held in Geneva, and which was preparatory to the World Radiocommunication Conference of 2019 (WRC-19).
Despite the pandemic having mandated a stop in international gatherings, the likes of Zoom and Teams have facilitated a “no change” to GVF’s primary mission in submitting comments on behalf of the industry in response to national consultations throughout the world; making presentations at regulatory conferences convened by the ITU, and others; and repeatedly advocating on behalf of the industry via discussions with multiple regulators – For example: the Secretary General’s participation in the ITU 22nd International Space Radio Monitoring Meeting in which he presented on interference issues in the GSO environment; and participation in CITEL’s PCC.II meetings held during 2021 where GVF repeatedly advocated for the industry on matters such as ESIMs and 28 GHz. All have been features of the countdown to WRC-23.
As with World Radiocommunication Conferences before, WRC-23 (20 November to 15 December) will result in decisions that will drive multi-billion dollar investments designed to enhance, grow, or develop businesses ranging from mobile communications and the Internet of Things, to 6G and broadband services for underserved populations. Leading up to WRC-23 will be many more meetings, and decisions, taken at the national and regional level which will greatly influence the Conference’s outcomes. As noted above, regulation is often a topic left to those expert in the finer things of spectrum management, but wider stakeholder communities need to be alert to the discussion agenda.
To this end the resumption, in late-January 2022, of the acclaimed GVF Webinar Series with an event entitled ‘Spectrum Regulation and Business’ will bring forth panel discussion to examine key spectrum issues to be decided upon in the run-up to, and at, WRC-23 and how such decisions will impact business in the years to come. Individuals responsible for developing new products and delivering services dependent upon satellite connectivity will find this panel discussion important.
While it has obviously been for many more reasons than its impact on international gatherings alone, the industry and wider world has been focused on the ongoing pandemic as we continue to face new virus variants and as we continue in our failure to address the imperative of universal global vaccination. At the outset of Covid-19 the satellite industry quickly responded to the elevated connectivity demands of economy, society and individuals; the latest illustration of the industry’s legacy of highly effective responses to disasters of many types.
Natural disasters around the world take many forms. Earthquakes, tsunamis, cyclones/hurricanes/typhoons, volcanic eruptions, floods, droughts, and famine. Human-made disasters – such as war, refugee population migrations, and now the exaccerbation of weather events with warming oceans and rising sea-levels through anthropogenic climate change – make our global condition yet more perilous. Building on its legacy, satellite is being increasingly called upon to yield up its unique advantages as exemplified in solutions for immediate response logistics operations and longer-term recovery programs, particularly when terrestrial communications infrastructures are knocked-out by the nature and magnitude of a disaster itself, just when they are needed most.
GVF has long been active at the very core of delivering satellite’s disaster response, no more so than when partnering in the development and implementation of the UN Crisis Connectivity Charter to which it is signatory; when as a member of the World Food Program administered Emergency Telecommunications Cluster; and when called upon to support the annual ‘Pacific Endeavor’ exercise of the United States Department of Defense Indo-Pacific Command Multinational Communication Interoperability Program for Humanitarian Assistance & Disaster Response, with which GVF has had a collaborative partnership since 2012.
One of my pre-pandemic business trips for GVF was to Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, for ‘Pacific Endeavor’ 2019. Together with my GVF colleague, Riaz Lamak, GVF’s Pacific Endeavor Lead, I had the pleasure of meeting senior and staff officers of many Indo-Pacific militaries. The primary element of GVF’s ‘Pacific Endeavor’ mission is to bring communications capacity building to the military communications and signals personnel of around 27 nations, together with their civilian partners. Over the years GVF has variously conducted presentation sessions, and hands-on practical training workshops to certify J6 military officials of participating nations in the installation and maintenance of satellite terminals, to ensure that during crisis or disaster GVF-certified first responders are on the ground, across the Indo-Asia-Pacific region. It can be noted here that GVF Training Certification, through its online training portfolio tool, offers over thirty courses which have been taken by more than 17,000 students worldwide.
Further illustrating its role in humanitarian assistance and disaster response, GVF has been asked to contribute to the REDCON Asia Webinar Series in 2022, under the theme 'Advancing Disaster Resilience through Game-Changing Emergency Telecommunications'. The webinar’s wide reaching dialogue – exploring how satellite services are a uniquely reliable and invaluable tool for emergency responders during disaster relief, and examining how satellite aids humanitarian organizations and repair crews during disaster management and recovery, as well as providing business continuity services post-disaster and backhaul capacity for network restoration – will encompass satellite regulatory matters as they pertain to the implementation of effective disaster management policies for using a diverse range of communication solutions, such as those in Fixed Satellite and Mobile Satellite services.
Every natural disaster and emergency is different, however, UN agencies, NGOs, military and other first responders recognize recurrent patterns, in as much as the damage typically sustained by terrestrial communication infrastructure can be quickly replaced using small aperture earth stations (fixed VSATs), vehicle-mounted earth stations (VMES) and transportable earth stations. VSATs, mobile-satellite terminals and ancillary equipment may be deployed to provide voice and data communication, field reporting, position information and facilitate data gathering and image transmission.
International recognition – through not only the UN Crisis Connectivity Charter but also through the earlier Tampere Convention (which eases deployment of telecommunication facilities during a disaster and is ratified by multiple nations ) – of the centrality of satellite communications must be accompanied by more national administrations following ITU (also a signatory to the Crisis Connectivity Charter) recommendations on the use of satellite frequency bands in their national disaster planning.
With the importance of satellite communications in disaster relief needing to be translated into the pre-planning of spectrum usage, the continuing challenge is at a national level, where regulators need to implement ad hoc licensing frameworks for the deployment of fixed and mobile satellite for disaster relief. Progress in this area has been achieved, but challenges remain in striving for a more harmonized framework for satellite services in disaster recovery. More transparency in satellite regulation and simplicity in licensing processes will yield more effective and speedy responses to – more numerous, more frequent, and more damaging – emergencies.
Of course, with the advent of non-geostationary satellite constellations we are now expanding beyond the geoststationary-only legacy. Current forecasts indicate that more satellites will be launched in the next two or three years than in the last 50 aggregated, and thus the industry and its regulators must ensure that a growing multi-orbit world can meet the expanding demands of all user communities, ensuring that the rules and regulations governing access to spectrum are sufficient for satellite networks to meet the needs around the globe. As well as continuing industry advocacy of regulatory streamlining, GVF works for the preservation of satellite spectrum in opposition to the terrestrial mobile industry’s exclusive spectrum resource-use demands.
National government policies and national regulator’s rules must be based on technology-neutrality, balanced to ensure that all technologies have access to the spectrum they require so as to avoid negatively impacting the ability to meet user demands. With satellite, and the next generation of space-based connectivity, meeting the spectrum needs of the world’s first responders, and all those that follow them, must prevail.
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Martin Jarrold is Vice-President of International Program Development of GVF. He can be reached at: martin.jarold@gvf.org
