Minister of Service Alberta Nate Glubish speaks at an announcement on funding to increase connectivity in remote areas Thursday at Enoch Cree Nation.

By Curtis Galbraith

Internet

Federal, provincial governments putting $150 million each into improving internet access in remote areas

Dec 16, 2021 | 5:15 PM

The federal and provincial governments have agreed to put $150 million each into expanding broadband internet in remote, rural and Indigenous communities.

The province first announced its share back in July and there is now an agreement in place with the federal government to provide a matching amount.

Minister of Service for Alberta Nate Glubish says they want to have the first projects approved early in the new year.

“When our two governments partner with the private sector, we could see this investment grow to north of $400 million. This is an extremely important first step. A very exciting first step but it is not the last step,” he explained.

“This agreement leaves the door open for future collaboration between the Alberta government and the federal government.”

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Glubish mentioned it will take close to $1 billion to complete this connectivity project.

“We know that there is not enough capacity to go and spend a billion dollars in one year or two years to solve this problem because there are limits in terms of supply chain, there are limits in terms of engineering expertise,” Glubish said.

“This will give us enough runway to get the most important projects done right away, in the near term.”

Federal Associate Minister of Finance and Edmonton MP Randy Boissonnault calls the agreement ” a down payment on a big project.”

“We don’t want to over-heat market by trying to do everything in the first year. We get priced out and, quite frankly, we would not be able to cover all the ground. You can’t build a house in a month.”

Glubish expects the first project approvals to come early in the new year.

He adds there have been hundreds of applications come in to do projects and that there are several criteria for which ones get approved, including regional fairness and reaching the most households.