Christmas is coming early for thousands of people in the state of Jalisco, as the Mexican government continues its handout of digital television sets in preparation for the analog shutdown next year.
Some 477,000 sets will be given away to mostly economically challenged families in Jalisco, part of 14 million to be distributed nationally. The beneficiaries are all incorporated in programs administered by Sedesol, Mexico’s federal social welfare agency.
The deadline for the transition from the analog to the digital system in Mexico is set for December 31, 2015. The switchover date in Jalisco has yet to be decided but is expected to be early next year.
As yet the only places to have carried out the changeover are Tijuana and parts of the state of Nuevo Leon.
A national program to collect worthless analog TVs will begin in January 2016.
Mexico is one of the only countries in the world to have chosen to distribute TV sets to the low-income homes rather than analog decoders.
T
he rationale was that digital TVs are better for the environment as they consume less power. Also, the new sets will have USB ports and may enable more people in disadvantaged situations to connect to the Internet. The cost differential, however, is considerable. The decoder boxes cost between US$48 and US$90 dollars, while the TVs range from US$218 to US$436.
The switchover got off to an inauspicious start in Tijuana last year, when delays in a pilot program to install free decoders meant that hundreds of citizens had not received their units by the scheduled day of the analog shutdown. As the switchover also coincided with local elections, the government decided to suspend the process.
Some critics say distributing free televisions rather the cheaper decoders is a ploy by the government to favor the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in the midterm elections scheduled for July 2015.
Distribution of the free digital TVs in Jalisco will be finished in February of next year, according to the Federal Telecommunications Institute, the independent government agency charged with the regulation of telecommunications and broadcasting services that was formed in September 2013, replacing the Federal Telecommunications Commission (Cofetel).
Deliveries of TVs throughout Mexico will be concluded by November 2015 – a month ahead of the switchover deadline.