Like most countries and territories in Oceania, telecommunications in the Cook Islands is limited by its isolation and low population, with only one major television broadcasting station and six radio stations. However, most residents have a main line or mobile phone. Its telecommunications are mainly provided by Telecom Cook Islands, who is currently working with O3b Networks, Ltd. for faster Internet connection.
Telephone
In July 2012, there were about 7,500 main line telephones, which covers about 98% of the country's population, while there were approximately 7,800 mobile phones in 2009. Telecom Cook Islands, owned by Spark New Zealand, is the islands' main telephone system and offers international direct dialling, Internet, email, fax, and Telex. The individual islands are connected by a combination of satellite earth stations, microwave systems, and very high frequency and high frequency radiotelephone; within the islands, service is provided by small exchanges connected to subscribers by open wire, cable, and fibre optic cable. For international communication, they rely on the satellite earth station Intelsat.
In 2003, the largest island of Rarotonga started using a GSM/GPRS mobile data service system with GSM 900/1900 networks by 2006.
The Cook Islands uses the country calling code +682.
Broadcasting
Radio
There are six radio stations in the Cook Islands, with one reaching all islands. As of 1997 there were 14,000 radios.
Television
Cook Islands Television broadcasts from Rarotonga, the capital of the Cook Islands, providing a mix of local news and overseas-sourced programs. As of 1997 there were 4,000 television sets.
Internet
There were 6,000 Internet users in 2009 and 3,562 Internet hosts as of 2012. The country code top-level domain for the Cook Islands is .ck.
In June 2010, Telecom Cook Islands partnered with O3b Networks, Ltd. to provide faster Internet connection to the Cook Islands. On 25 June 2013 the O3b satellite constellation was launched from an Arianespace Soyuz ST-B rocket in French Guinea. The medium Earth orbit satellite orbits at 8,062 kilometres (5,009Â mi) and uses the Ka band. It has a latency of about 100 milliseconds because it is much closer to Earth than standard geostationary satellites, whose latencies can be over 600 milliseconds. Although the initial launch consisted of 4 satellites, as many as 20 may be launched eventually to serve various areas with little or no optical fibre service, the first of which is the Cook Islands.
References
External links
- Telecom Cook Islands