MANILA, Philippines—The Commission on Information and Communications Technology (CICT) is asking the Board of Investments (BOI) to provide tax breaks to broadband service providers.

This is to encourage these companies to deploy services in rural areas.

In an interview during the launch of the Convergence 2009 national roadshow and talent caravan yesterday, CICT Chair Ray Anthony Roxas-Chua III said such incentives would encourage investments in low-income, usually missionary, provincial areas.

“We’re proposing incentives for new broadband deployments in rural areas. This will help in the expansion of such services beyond the urban centers,” he said. “We have proposed this to the BOI, and it’s still under review.”

He, however, admitted that it would be “a challenge” to secure such incentives, particularly at this time when government revenues were expected to go down.

“But we’ll still continue to push for it. We believe incentives to operators and [Internet service providers] are important to encourage them to invest,” he said.

Should the CICT fail to secure BOI incentives for broadband providers, he said increased deployment could still be encouraged through other means, including the imposition of a universal access charge or the provision of government subsidies.

In a separate presentation, Telecommunications Office executive director Graciano Sitchon said urban areas in the country were already 100-percent covered by broadband services. Rural areas, on the other hand, are only 40-percent covered.

The country’s broadband penetration, however, was still at a single-digit level, “near the very bottom,” he said.

“Broadband is a major component of CICT’s vision of an e-Philippines. With penetration at very low levels, there’s a need to create different ICT applications to drive broadband adoption and utilization,” he said. “Wireless broadband is also an excellent technology to extend broadband services in underserved and unserved areas.”