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REGULAR REPORT
FROM THE COMMISSION
ON
SLOVENIA'S
PROGRESS TOWARDS ACCESSION

3.2 Innovation

Telecommunications

With respect to its comparative economic development, Slovenia has not yet achieved as much progress as it should in the liberalisation of the telecommunications sector and the harmonisation of legislation.

The implementing measures, needed for the implementation of the Telecommunications Act adopted in May 1997, such as the mutual recognition of conformity of type approval certificates and a comprehensive licensing regime have yet not been adopted. Liberalisation of public voice telephony and of alternative networks for the provision of telecoms services have not been introduced. The establishment of a separate regulatory authority, the decree on licensing regimes, the regulation on type approval and mutual recognition of certification have not been introduced yet. Tariffs have not been re-balanced.

The major achievements to-date have been the liberalisation of terminal equipment and telecommunications services (with the exception of the above). However, the absence of progress on mutual recognition of conformity and type approval means that equipment can only be purchased in Slovenia.

Another achievement during last year has been the liberalisation of the market for the mobile telephony services by granting a second GSM license to the Simobil consortium in October 1998,(25% of the capital of the this concessionaire is foreign capital).

The infrastructure is constantly improving. By the end of 1997, the penetration rate in the telephone service was 35.8%. At the end of 1997 there were 4.4 employees per 1000 lines. The average waiting time for a telephone line improved from 1.8 years (1995) to 1.2 years (1997). As for the economic performance of the public operator Telecom Slovenije, the revenue per lines increased from ECU 344 (1995) to ECU 388 (1997).

There are still insufficient resources in the Ministry of Transport and Telecommunications to tackle the considerable remaining task of legislative harmonisation effectively (both on liberalisation and regulatory functions aspects). Priorities in the Ministry of Transport and Telecommunications as well as the management of the national operator Telekom Slovenije appears to predominantly favour the development of infrastructure and services.

Slovenia's progress in enacting, implementing and enforcing the acquis communautaire in the telecommunications sector is proceeding very slowly. Institution building in this sector seems particularly urgent in order to reduce the harmonisation backlog.

The most urgent actions remain the full implementation of the Law on Telecommunications starting with the gradual liberalisation of the voice telephony market for closed user groups and the provision of Internet services by CATV operators.

Conclusion

Slovenia continues to support research and technological development activities. Little progress has been made in the telecommunications and audio-visual sectors. Slovenia has requested a two year transition period for fully implementing the television with frontiers directive.