China plans nationwide broadband by 2020

China plans to complete broadband coverage in both its urban and rural areas by 2020.

The State Council, China's cabinet announced on Saturday it elevated national broadband development as a national strategy and has announced an implementation timeline for its development over the next eight years, China Daily reported.

The strategy aims at rolling out Wi-Fi coverage in key public urban areas by 2013 and fixed broadband coverage for half of Chinese households by 2015. Homes in some developed cities will also enjoy a broadband speed of 1GB per second in 2020. 

The plan will also be carried out in three different stages, with fiber optic networks and 3G mobile coverage to be facilitated in 2013, while broadband coverage will be expanded from 2014 to 2015. Broadband network and technology updates will be the key task from 2016 to 2020.

The Chinese government had previously announced it was looking to add more fixed-line broadband households and public Wi-Fi hotspots in 2013 for 4M broadband. It also aimed to have more than 250 million broadband users while raising access speeds in both urban and rural areas, with service coverage hitting 95 percent by the end of 2015. 

In response to the government's goal of having 75 percent of broadband users on 4Mbps this year, local telco China Unicom also said it will start raising broadband speeds in Beijing starting May 17, 2013 by phasing out lower speed packages with faster connections.