The week-long deliberation, ITRealms Online gathered holds
every three to four years, while the Radiocommunication Assembly deliberated on
the future direction of radiocommunications and reached significant decisions
that will impact the future mostly in an increasingly wireless environment.
The Radiocommunication Assembly (RA-12) chaired by Mr. A.R.
Jamieson of New Zealand, had over 500 participants from 102 countries in
attendance the Assembly.
RA-12 approved a series of Recommendations and Resolutions
that established the International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT)-Advanced
technologies and initiated further studies for the development of global mobile
broadband communications.
According to the Secretary-General, ITU, Dr. Hamadoun Touré,
the Radiocommunication Assembly, like the World Radiocommunication Conference
represents an important landmark in the life of ITU’s Radiocommunication
Sector.
This Assembly, he said, has once again demonstrated the
central role that the Radiocommunication Sector plays in the global development
of information and communication technologies.
Based on the new milestone in global mobile broadband, he
said, the specifications for the next step in mobile broadband wireless
technology – IMT-Advanced; were agreed by the Assembly.
He pointed out that with the completion of an intensive
programme developed by ITU’s Radiocommunication Sector (ITU-R) to stimulate
global development of the future IMT technologies.
He emphasised that following a detailed evaluation against
stringent technical and operational criteria, ITU has determined that
LTE-Advanced and WirelessMAN-Advanced should be accorded the official
designation of IMT-Advanced.
He explained that IMT-Advanced systems include new
capabilities that go beyond IMT-2000, widely deployed since 2000 and referred
to as 3G mobile technology.
ITU, therefore, specified the standards for IMT-Advanced,
the next step in global wireless broadband communications.
Stressing that IMT-Advanced provides comprehensive support
for broadband wireless data and brings major improvements.
These, the Assembly outlined to include increased spectrum
efficiency to handle more users at higher data rates per radio channel; a fully
packet-based architecture for reduced costs; lower latency leading to more
responsive Internet and multimedia applications.
Additionally, the Assembly underscored the fact that
improved radio resource management and control would enhance quality of
service, and new capabilities for the radio interface such as wideband radio
channels and multiple-input and multiple-output
(MIMO) for the use of multiple antennas at both the transmitter and
receiver-end to improve communication performance.
The RA-12 also decided to conduct further studies related to
the development of a continuous time standard in order to address the concerns
of countries that use the current system of the leap second in Coordinated
Universal Time (UTC).
The decision, ITRealms Online gathered, was reached to
ensure that all the technical options related to the issue are fully addressed,
adding that these studies will involve further discussions within the ITU
membership and with other organizations that have an interest in the matter
related to the suppression of the leap second and will be referred to the next
Radiocommunication Assembly and World Radiocommunication Conference scheduled
for 2015.
Further, the Radiocommunication Assembly it was gathered
planned for future technologies and based on the approved resolutions to focus
studies on new radiocommunication techniques and applications, such as
cognitive radio systems, and on the potential for radiocommunications to act as
a catalyst to reduce the impact of human activity on the environment.
RA-12 also agreed on changes to streamline the working
methods of the ITU Radiocommunication Sector in adopting recommendations and
elected the chairmen and vice-chairmen of the Study Groups that will conduct
the work in the next four years.
The Radiocommunication Assembly provides the necessary
technical bases for the work of the World Radiocommunication Conferences, sets
future work programmes on many technical issues of a worldwide character in the
field of radiocommunications, and approves worldwide radiocommunication
standards (ITU-R Recommendations).
Remmy Nweke
ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D
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