Life-saving connectivity under threat in remote Far North

A new video series launches this week featuring Far Northerners from Pawarenga, Te Paki and Te Hāpua discussing the importance of mobile sites to rural communities, where connectivity is positively changing lives – and saving them too.

Since 2017, the Rural Connectivity Group (RCG) has installed 570 mobile cell sites in rural areas throughout Aotearoa. Of those, 57 are in Northland providing voice, data, text and wireless broadband services to communities where services were previously limited or non-existent.

The RCG programme connects marae, farms, schools, students, and communities enabling rural residents across Te Tai Tokerau to work remotely, do banking online, access telehealth services, and connect to education. More than one million calls, including critical emergency 111 calls, are also being made in Northland each month via the sites.

Despite the huge social and economic benefits, critical cell site equipment is regularly being vandalised and stolen, cutting remote communities off from emergency and other services that they have come to rely on. Repairing the damage is costing hundreds of thousands of dollars – money ear-marked for new cell sites for other isolated communities.

In collaboration with the RCG, Far North District Council has created a video series where residents explain how their remote communities benefit from being able to connect to mobile providers Spark, One NZ and 2degrees at work, home, in the bush or on the coast. They provide real-life examples of how mobile and broadband connectivity has enabled them to: activate emergency services, connect to health providers, improve health and safety when working in remote areas, allow businesses to access payment and information services, access mobile apps to track hazards, farming data and environmental programmes, and better enable responses during Civil Defence emergencies.

One video a week will be released over the next six weeks from today (Thursday 8 January) on the council’s Facebook page. Each video will be added to this news story once it is released.

Anyone witnessing suspicious behaviour near a remote cell site should report it to RCG via its website or by calling 0800 724 2255.

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Watch our first video to hear how connecting to medical services is transforming one community.