The Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) has committed to rolling out its free Wi-Fi services to more than 20,000 additional sites nationwide, at the very least, on an estimated budget of P3 billion to P4 billion.
In an interview after President Marcos Jr.’s State of the Nation Address (SONA), DICT Secretary Henry Aguda said they have been looking for ways to expand further and connect up to 50,000 new sites next year, including around 10,000 to 12,000 health centers and hospitals, and potentially tens of thousands of barangay halls.
But despite the scale, Aguda said the funding requirement proposed by the DICT would be manageable. “We’re looking at roughly the same budget we used this year, about P3 to P4 billion,” Aguda said during an interview at the sidelines in a post-SONA event of the government, on July 30.
“Of that amount, around P3 billion will go directly to the Free Wi-Fi program,” Aguda said.
The DICT’s Free Wi-Fi program services have been running in 19,000 sites and in a partnership with the Department of Education (DepEd), the DICT has been working double-time to install free WiFi in additional 12,000 schools by the end of 2025.
For 2026, the DICT, using P3 billion to P4 billion, will deploy free WiFi in around 10,000 to 12,000 health centers and hospitals, and has set plans to connect tens of thousands of barangay halls, to bring total coverage to roughly 50,000 sites by 2026, Aguda said.
Funding will be drawn from the Spectrum User Fee (SUF), which generates an estimated P6 billion to P9 billion annually.
The SUF is a government revenue source collected from telecom companies for the use of radio frequencies.
Aguda said the DICT has partnered with telecommunications companies to start constructing cell sites in select remote areas.
Alongside free WiFi services, the DICT has been rolling out the Bayanihan SIM program, to provide free SIM cards to students and teachers in public schools, and connect up to 5 million Filipinos by the end 2025, Aguda said.
