On March 6, 2017 in Guatemala City, Guatemala, there was a seminar to introduce digital terrestrial TV in Guatemala. The seminar was organized by the Superintendencia de Telecomunicaciones (SIT), and DiBEG was requested by Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) of Japan to join and dispatch its representative to the Seminar together with some other presenters from Japan, including Mr. H. Horiwaka, JICA Expert in digital terrestrial TV stationed in Costa Rica but covering Guatemala as one of his contributing countries.
The seminar was started with the welcome speech by Mr. Harold Cancinos, SIT’s operations manager, as the substitution of the Superintendent; and there were approximately 80 people participating, from such as Ministry of Communications, Infrastructure and Housing, National Disaster Prevention Agency, broadcasters, universities, research institutions, consumer groups, media, etc. Main guests included the representatives from the Brazilian Embassy in Guatemala.
The presentation by the representative of SIT introduced that they are planning to simulcast digital terrestrial TV by vacating the channels from CH-52 through CH-69 that are now being used for analog TV broadcasting; that they would gradually decrease the analog broadcasting; and that all the analog TV broadcasting would be switched off in 5 years from the start of digital terrestrial television.
He also explained that it is necessary to avoid frequency intermodulation with neighboring countries, that they would study the frequency allocation planning of these neighboring countries, and that they are performing various trials and experiments in the border areas.
He added that SIT would make good use of SFN (single frequency network) for the efficient utilization of frequency.
Questions raised by some of the seminar participants included the timing of the launch of digital terrestrial TV, any possibility of distributing STB units to low income people, etc.
The Japanese delegation, including Mr. T. Shibata, Deputy Director of MIC, Mr. H. Horikawa, JICA Expert, etc. made presentations on their experiences in the transition to digital TV, such as frequency re-allocation and PR activities toward the general public, as well as the latest situation of other ISDB-T adopting countries in Latin America on the digital TV implementation.
Guatemalan broadcasters and related industry people raised many technical questions such as frequency allocation planning and SFN; showing their strong interests in digital terrestrial television among wide variety of business sectors.