The Zambian government has ordered that all television stations in the country migrate from analog modulated radio frequency technology to digital format in order to catch up with global broadcasting technology.

Digital broadcasting will increase channel capacity and allow more channels to be offered within a fixed amount of bandwidth, said Emmanuel Nyirenda, permanent secretary in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services.

"Digital television allows transmission of pictures with higher resolution and better pictures and quality sound. Therefore, all stations must migrate to digital technology by 2015," Nyirenda announced last week at a workshop on digital migration in Lusaka.

However, the acquisition of set-top boxes remains a major hurdle to digital migration in Zambia. The public will have to buy the boxes in order to convert signals, and the cost of the boxes has not yet been determined.

The International Telecommunications Union, the world's telecom regulator, had set a deadline of 2015 for the global switch over from analog to digital broadcasting.