This familiarization tour is part of the process to understand state-owned telecommunications infrastructure.
Speaking during the tour the minister said, "The data earth station center is important in encoding and decoding information data collection, storage and consolidation of Information."
The Mazowe earth station was opened by late former president Robert Mugabe 35 years ago (in 1985) to facilitate control and communications among distant places.
According to TelOne sources, the station is currently providing internet to over 1000 subscribers, powering satellite schools and will soon provide internet for smart farming.
Over the past years Telone has been deploying initiatives to keep the station alive , in 1998 they deployed the first VSAT hub , to provide data services to the mining industry operating at the borders , the system was decommissioned in 2005 when the company ran out of forex to upgrade.
Since 2011 traffic reduced from satellites to submarine cables, hence in 2018 a data center was deployed at Mazowe as a redundant site to Harare data center hosting some banks.
