A coalition of 11 African universities and two higher education organizations, with support from four major US foundations, have arrived at an agreement with satellite service provider Intelsat that will bring vastly expanded Internet bandwidth capacity and capability to academic institutions on the continent, at approximately one-third of the cost.

The Bandwidth Initiative is one of the major collaborative projects of the Partnership for Higher Education in Africa, work that began five years ago to build on momentum within Africa to revitalize institutions of higher education.

The foundations involved, Ford, MacArthur, Rockefeller, and Carnegie Corporation of New York, have invested more than US$150 million in partnership projects. Over the next five years, the foundations will invest an additional $200 million and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation will participate.

Bandwidth is a major expense for African universities, with service currently provided by a patchwork of providers. According to a report prepared by the Bandwidth Consortium of the Partnership for Higher Education in Africa, consumers in Europe and North America typically pay $100 a month for far more bandwidth than African universities obtain for $10,000 per month. In all but a handful of African countries, less than two percent of the population is online.

"When African universities have the capacity to connect with the Internet at speeds approaching those available to others around the world, we will have taken one of the most important steps possible in our efforts to become a full member of the world"s academic community," says Mamman Aminu Ibrahim, convenor of the Nigeria ICT Forum of Partnership Institutions.

"Bandwidth technology is central to the transformation of higher education in Africa." The contract with Intelsat will provide access to 93,000 kilobytes per second of bandwidth each month. As recently as two years ago, the total bandwidth available to them was 12,000kbps. The unit cost per kbps will drop from an average of $7.30 per kbps per month for the African universities to $2.33. As more institutions participate, the cost may drop further.

Planning and negotiations for the Internet work was done by the Bandwidth Consortium, comprising members from the 11 universities. Groundwork for the consortium was coordinated by the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, whose research served as the blueprint for negotiations with Intelsat.

The host institution for the Bandwidth Consortium is the African Virtual University, an organization which provides satellite-based distance learning education through its centers around Africa.

The new service, to be available by the end of the year, is the result of a three-year-long effort by the universities to assess their needs and on-the-ground technical capacity necessary to manage bandwidth provided in bulk by satellite. The service will start with the coalition members, but is designed to allow many others to join over time.

The members of the Bandwidth Consortium are:

* Eduardo Mondlane University (Mozambique);

* University of Dar es Salaam (Tanzania);

* Makerere University (Uganda);

* University of Ghana (Ghana);

* University of Education, Winneba (Ghana);

* University of Ibadan (Nigeria);

* Obafemi Awolowo University (Nigeria);

* Ahmadu Bello University (Nigeria);

* Bayero University (Nigeria);

* Port Harcourt University (Nigeria);

* University of Jos (Nigeria);

* Association of African Universities;

* Kenya Education Network.