ENG-1970 — Page 231

COMMUNICATIONS

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for the control and supervision of all telecommunication services. operating within and from the Colony. The Telecommunication Division of the Post Office licences and inspects installations operating under the Ordinance, monitors radio transmissions, and investigates interference. The division also provides an advisory service to the government and co-ordinates the communication requirements of departments.

Overseas communications are provided by Cable and Wireless, Limited. Hong Kong is linked by an 80-channel submarine telephone cable westwards to Singapore and eastwards to Guam from where telegraph, telex and telephone circuits extend to all parts of the world.

In addition to the underseas cable a satellite earth station work- ing via the Pacific Intelsat III satellite provides circuits to Japan, USA, Thailand, South Korea and Australia. Other destinations will be added as and when necessary. A second earth station working to the Indian Ocean satellite is being constructed, to be operational in 1971.

HF Radio circuits connect to 12 countries providing, in com- bination with undersea cables and satellite links, a total of 311 telegraph and 214 telephone circuits terminating in Hong Kong.

Because of the very rapid rise in demand which followed installa- tion of the first computer-based system in 1969, the electronic data processing message switching centre handling traffic for international airlines and commercial firms and also the public telegrams service, is being expanded by the addition of a fifth computer and additional electronic storage. When completed, the new system-probably the largest of its type in the world-is expected to handle 21,000 messages an hour and have a theoretical capacity of half a million a day.

With the installation of the new telecine equipment in 1970, Cable and Wireless is able to provide news agencies with a 'round- the-clock' international television service for televising news to and from Hong Kong and many overseas countries via Intelsat III satellite.

To cater for the ever-growing telex demand a new fully automatic telex exchange providing many additional facilities is planned to