Nigeria with the population of over 180 million needs between
70,000 and 80,000 telecommunication base stations to actualize her dream of
joining the club of countries working toward making Internet of Things (IoT) a
reality by leveraging Forth Generation (4G) and Fifth Generation (5G) networks,
reports ITRealms.
The Internet of things (IoT), ITRealms reports, is the inter-networking of physical devices, vehicles (also referred to as "connected devices" and "smart devices"), buildings, and other items—embedded with electronics, software, sensors, actuators, and network connectivity that enable these objects to collect and exchange data, according to Wikipedia.
Disclosing this at a sitting of the House Representatives’
Ad Hoc Committee investigating the health implications of mounting
telecommunications masts close to building, in Abuja, the Executive Vice
Chairman, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Prof Umar Garba Danbatta, said
the country currently has less than 50,000 base stations.
“3G, 4G going to 5G networks are going to usher this country
into smart applications, the Internet of Things or the smart world and cities
we are talking about. And of course because of the additional burden on
infrastructure, the present capacity of telecom infrastructure is grossly
inadequate to cater for these additional platforms or services we talk
about’
“Therefore we will need from 70,000 to 80,000 base
transceiver masts to be able to provide the effective capacity that’s needed to
deploy 4G going to 5G,” he said while responding to questions from members of
the ad hoc committee.
He later called on other approving agencies at all levels of
government in the country synergize with NCC a view to achieving the target, noting
that the United Kingdom (UK), with a population of almost one third of Nigeria
already has close to 60,000 masts.
On concerns about health implications to exposure to
electromagnetic field, Danbatta said researches so far conducted in the area
have not indicated any adverse health concerns.
“With regards to other professional bodies like Nigerian
Society of Engineers (NSE) we don’t have any quarrel with their positions. The
only question is when we say exposure to electromagnetic field is hazardous to
health what level are we talking about?
We have to define the level of exposure that is hazardous to human
beings.
“Of course if you generate a massive electromagnetic field
of unprecedented proportion and put a person inside, there will be medical
consequences. But what we are saying is that: provided the limit specified is
observed and NCC is there to ensure compliance with that limit, there is no
health hazard. There is a limit of
safety below which electromagnetic fields do not cause any harm to health,” he
declared.
Uboshe Uboshe/GEE
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