Bolivia's push for a satellite
In recent weeks, there has been much talk of Bolivia’s President, Evo Morales, in talks with various people to help Bolivia to launch a communications satellite in the near future.
This is a great push by Morales in my opinion, Bolivia’s technology infrastructure is very sluggish and developing at a snails pace. To bring greater technology to the country will help it advance and as Evo has suggested create jobs and improve education. My experience with Bolivian technology has been that they have the same equipment we do – internet, modern computers, cell phones, large TVs, cable television, mp3 players, etc (much of it is in fact imported from the US). The difference is the infrastructure is 10-15 years behind ours. If this satellite is launched and managed properly, it could greatly close this gap.
This week, Morales is visiting the UN General Assembly, where he will speak with Chinese officials about hiring them to build a satellite. Morales is hoping to launch such a satellite by October 2010. It will certainly be interesting to see how this progresses . . .
