Free Essays, Term Papers, Research Papers at Anti Essays

Open-Access Issues in the Chilean
Telecommunications and
Electricity Sectors
DRAFT
Carlos Diaz
Universidad de los Andes
and
Raimundo Soto
Universidad Alberto Hurtado
August, 1999
Infrastructure and Financial Markets Division
Sustainable Developement Department
Inter-American Development Bank
We would like to thank Ricardo Paredes, Felipe Morandé, Leonardo Mena, and Jorge Fritis for valuable
information. Remaining errors are, nevertheless, our own. Detailed comments by Federico Basañes are
gratefully acknowledged.
Open-Access Issues in the Chilean
Telecommunications and
Electricity Sectors
DRAFT
Carlos Diaz
Universidad de los Andes
and
Raimundo Soto
Universidad Alberto Hurtado
Washington, D.C.
August, 1999
1
1. Introduction
The recent wave of infrastructure restructuring and privatization in Latin American countries is
characterized by the introduction of competition in areas that in the past were considered to be natural
monopolies. Regulation efforts have successfully expanded the scope of competition in various sectors with
network and natural monopoly characteristics. Industries like electricity, natural gas, telecommunications and
transport are being restructured and competition is being introduced in different degrees depending on the
particular conditions of the markets. In most of these industries, the competing activities still need to use the
existing networks to provide the service, so the policy relevance of the access conditions and pricing has been
heightened. For competition to be effective, and to take advantage of network externalities, open access to some
still-regulated facilities of these industries is required.
The policy-maker must create proper conditions for entry into the...