Afghanistan Digital CASA Project

active

Prospective

The objective of the Digital Central Asia South Asia Project for Afghanistan is to increase access to more affordable Internet, crowd-in private investment in the ICT sector and improve the participating governments’ capacity to deliver digital government services in Central Asia and parts of South Asia, through the development of a regionally integrated digital infrastructure and enabling environment. There are four components to the project, the first component being regional and domestic connectivity. The objective of this component is to crowd-in private sector investments to improve regional and domestic fiber-optic connectivity infrastructure, connect public institutions, and priority target groups to the Internet at affordable rates, and bring down the overall cost of Internet services. This component will finance the following activities. This component includes three subcomponents: pre-purchase of international bandwidth and viability gap funding for optical fiber connectivity. Government network providing broadband connectivity to public institutions, and internet exchange points. The second component is the e-government. The objectives of this component are to: (a) establish critical e-Government foundations that comprise the government cloud, common e-service enablers, and the DRDC and (b) deliver socioeconomic benefits to the citizens and businesses by enhancing the national portal and developing prioritized e-services to enable citizens and businesses to gain access to information and e-services through their mobile devices. This component includes two subcomponents: establishment of a shared e-Government infrastructure and common e-service enablers, enhancing the national portal and prioritized e-services. The third component is the enabling environment. This component will finance: (a) TAs for the MCIT and ATRA to address the policy, legal, and regulatory modifications needed, such as the development of a national broadband policy, and issuance of decrees, guidelines, and downstream regulations (for example, right-of-way, interconnection, quality of service, tariff regulations), to implement the OAP and create an enabling environment to crowd-in private sector investment and promote competition in the sector; and (b) review and assess existing ICT policies, strategies, standards, and legal and regulatory frameworks to identify gaps and weaknesses, and to harmonize with regional commitments and frameworks. Special focus will be aimed at harmonizing legislation and regulatory policies at the regional level to facilitate cross-border interconnection, such as interconnection charges and taxation of incoming/outgoing traffic, interconnection regulations, licensing frameworks, cybersecurity and cyber threat management, and spectrum management, among others. Finally, the fourth component is the project management and institutional strengthening. This component will finance project management as well as institutional strengthening and capacity development activities to ensure that activities are implemented effectively and integrated with the overall regional program.

FY17 - Information and Communications Technologies

World Bank Group

Project

Rail, Broadband, Telecommunications, Government