BBS ICT Project
(Information Communications Technology)

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BBS ICT Project Communities Page

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The BBS ICT Project communities are Burgeo, François , Grand Bruit, Grey River and Ramea. Each of these communities are located on Newfoundland’s rugged south west coast, and with the exception of Burgeo are accessible only by ferry. From the beginning, the economies of these communities, along with most communities in Newfoundland have mainly relied on the North Atlantic cod fishery as their primary means of support, but in the wake of the collapse of the fishery in the early 1990’s it has become necessary for them to find other sources of income.

As a result of the fishery collapse there has been a significant loss in revenue to the communities and a corresponding drain in the population of the region. With a diminished tax base the entire region has been forced to cut back on essential services within the communities, forcing local residents to travel outside their communities to larger centers in order to find essential health care and educational services.

It is for these reasons that it has become necessary to interconnect the five BBS ICT project communities, for the purpose of sharing teaching and educational resources, for the use of telemedicine, and as a tool for economic development. Due to the rugged terrain surrounding the communities, and also due to the great distance of these communities from larger urban center conventional high-speed Internet technologies such as fiber optics are prohibitively expensive. Because of this it has become necessary to make use of wireless networking technologies inorder to achieve the project goals.