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This map shows the 396,766 route kilometres of live terrestrial fibre optic network in Africa (Q1, 2012), and the distance to nodes on these fibre networks.
The Fibre Reach application is designed to showcase new transmission projects as they go live, extending the reach of terrestrial fibre transmission networks in Africa.
This map data shown here is excerpted from the 2011 Africa Telecom Transmission Map, sponsored by Gateway Communications.
Click the Locate button to centre the map on your location, or Search to find other towns or cities within reach of networks. Click Layers to turn map layers on and off. Zoom in and click the pushpins for sample articles from Africa Bandwidth Maps.
Fibre Reach is a metric: the number of people living within range of a fibe optic network. High capacity fibre transmission networks underpin the ability of operators to deliver broadband services.
Every day, Africa’s fibre transmission networks are expanding, increasing the number of people that fall within reach of one of these networks.
On average, 85-kms of new terrestrial fibre optic network has entered service per day in Africa in the last year (Q1, 2012). A further 66,640-km of fibre is currently under construction, 93,519-km is planned, and 30,885-km is proposed (Q1, 2012).
The table below shows that 37.4 million people live within a 25-km reach of a submarine cable network. This will increase to 46.6 million once the WACS, ACE and SEAS cables enter service during 2012. However, 313.2 million people were within reach of a terrestrial fibre optic node connected to these submarine cables. This number will increase to 355 million once network which is under construction is completed, and will increase again to 418 million once network which is planned or proposed is completed. Between 2010 and 2011, the expansion of terrestrial fibre networks brought an additional 54 million people within reach of a fibre node.
Population Within Reach of Fibre Network Node
Millions, Sub-Saharan Africa, 2011
| Range To Fibre Network Node | 10-km | 25-km | 50-km |
| Submarine Cable Landing Point Operational | 15.3 | 37.4 | 49.8 |
| Submarine Cable Landing Point Under Construction | 20.8 | 46.6 | 61.3 |
| Terrestrial Fibre Network Operational | 160.6 | 313.2 | 483.9 |
| Terrestrial Fibre Network Under Construction | 181.2 | 355.1 | 542.5 |
| Terrestrial Fibre Network Planned and Proposed | 214.1 | 417.9 | 630.3 |
Source: Hamilton Research Ltd
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About us: Hamilton Research Ltd is a specialist provider of research, analysis and GIS cartographic services for telecom markets in Africa and other developing regions. We research and publish the Africa Telecom Transmission Map, and maintain quarterly updated datasets of Africa’s terrestrial transmission networks and international bandwidth.
Fibre Reach Mobile Application Version 1.0 (May 2012). This mobile map application is built using Openlayers, JQuery Mobile, and ESRI ArcGIS. Usage: The map data contained in the Fibre Reach mobile application is released by Hamilton Research Ltd under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported Licence.