While Paramaribo is becoming increasingly digitalised, a large part of Suriname’s interior remains digitally behind. In 2026, this can hardly still be justified. We cannot continue to speak of national digitalisation as long as thousands of Surinamese have insufficient access to one of the most important forms of infrastructure of our time.
A child in Paramaribo can follow online lessons, look up information and make use of modern digital tools and AI applications. A child deep in Sipaliwini does not always have those opportunities. This is how we create inequality before young people even enter the labour market.
E-learning in particular could help compensate for part of the shortage of teachers in the interior. Not as a replacement for the teacher, but as a tool to make knowledge and education available in places where physical capacity is lacking.
Digital support for healthcare
Healthcare, too, pays the price for the lack of reliable internet connections. The Medische Zending is heavily dependent on aviation for transport to remote areas.
Reliable internet can connect medical posts directly with doctors and specialists in Paramaribo. Telemedicine, digital patient records and direct consultations can ensure that costly transport is more often limited to cases in which it is actually necessary.
The same applies to entrepreneurs in the tourism, agriculture and craft sectors. Without a reliable internet connection, they lack access to online marketing, reservation systems, training, digital payments and customers beyond their immediate surroundings.
When we can extract natural resources from the interior, we must also be willing to reinvest part of that prosperity in the people who live there.
The world has changed
For years, it was argued that installing fibre-optic cables, antennas and other infrastructure through hundreds of kilometres of rainforest is too expensive and complicated. But the world has changed. LEO satellite technology, such as Starlink and Amazon LEO, makes it possible to provide remote areas with broadband internet relatively quickly. Combined with solar panels and battery storage, villages can have independent digital centres for education, healthcare, government services and entrepreneurship.
The technology exists. Why are we still waiting?
While technology is developing at lightning speed, Suriname continues to debate regulations and amendments to the Telecommunicatiewet. But must the development of the interior truly wait because our legislation cannot keep up with technology?
A temporary permit as a solution
Why not consider a temporary or limited permit, or a permit specifically applicable to the interior, under clear conditions and supervision? This would allow Suriname to gain experience with this technology, while policymakers simultaneously work on a modern legal framework.
Legislation should steer technological development in the right direction, not bring an entire country to a technological standstill. Digital inclusion is not charity. It is economic infrastructure. When a child in Sipaliwini gains access through a tablet to the same knowledge as a child in Paramaribo, a medical post can consult a specialist directly and an entrepreneur from the interior can reach customers around the world, we will have done far more than merely connect the internet. Then we will have brought Suriname closer together.
The technology is there. Now all that is needed is political resolve.
Henk Yorks
Innovation Ambassador
me@henkyorks.com
