Marcos: Nat’l broadband program gains ground, ‘common towers’ pushed

Highlights: SONA 2024

MANILA, Philippines — The National Fiber Backbone program has gained ground, while the common tower policy will be further pushed to provide wider internet access to Filipinos.


President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. touted this progress during his third State of the Nation Address (Sona) on Monday.


Marcos said the first Phase of the National Fiber Backbone program has been “completed and operationalized.”


READ: Nat’l Fiber Backbone launched, starting with Laoag-QC phase

The Phase two and three of the program began this year and is expected to be completed in 2026.


“This fiber backbone will give us efficient  capacity  in terms of bandwidth,” Marcos said.

As of 2022, only 77 percent or 20.6 million households are connected to the internet, according to Marcos.


“This is much too low,” Marcos said of the data.


“Together with our private sector partners, we will efficiently harness the concept of common towers to provide connectivity to Filipino who are at the far end of the last mile,” he said.


“Expect full government support to ensure the successful completion of this critical project including policy reforms and streamlined processes,” he added.