Government plans to turn an eye on the sky in an attempt to establish a satellite services industry on the Island.

Finance Minister Paula Cox spelled out the proposal to build an ?earth station? ? a facility normally fitted with at least one large dish for communicating with and tracking satellites.

Earth stations handle communications traffic, sending and receiving signals to and from satellites more than 20,000 miles above the Earth. They are used in the transmission of television pictures, telephone calls, computer data, fax, video conferencing and telex signals.

There are around 200 earth stations in the world, according to the website of the Goonhilly Earth Satellite Station in Britain. Goonhilly, situated in Cornwall, is the world?s biggest earth station, with 60 dishes built on a 160-acre site.

Ms Cox said: ?A key initiative of the Ministry of the Environment, Telecommunications and E-Commerce (METEC) is to develop a satellite services industry in Bermuda. One component of this initiative is the creation of an earth station facility for telemetry, tracking and control of satellites.

?The installation of a physical satellite earth station facility in Bermuda would be attractive for companies with an interest in North American and European satellite networks. In that regard, there may be an opportunity to issue and manage multiple virtual satellite licences associated with a single earth station facility.?

Standards for earth stations, which are fitted with microwave radio transmitters and antennae, are set by the world?s largest satellite services provider, Intelsat. The higher the ?antenna gain?, the better the standard. A larger dish usually gives a higher gain.

It is not known what stage plans for the station have reached, nor where it will be built. No further information was available from METEC yesterday.

Ms Cox also addressed the issue of telecommunications reform, stressing that ?encouraging Bermudian ownership and employment in telecommunications industry is a major focus of METEC?.

The Ministry?s proposals for reform ? which include abandoning the 60:40 rule ? have come under fire from some predominantly locally-owned telecom businesses, because they fear that Bermudian ownership will be wiped out as foreign-owned giants take over the industry.

Ms Cox also said METEC would establish a pilot programme in the North Hamilton Economic Empowerment Zone to deliver basic ?e-literacy? to people not familiar with modern computer technology, so they were not ?left behind in the digital economy?.

The scheme, set up in partnership with the Bermuda Small Business Development Corporation, will allow users access to information technology and the internet.