Evaluation of Spectrum Occupancy: A Case for Cognitive Radio in Uganda

In recent years, proliferation of wireless devices has increased wireless access to nearly all of the world´s population and use of services like mobile systems, GPS and Wi-Fi. Users are mobile, dynamic and majority prefer the 30MHz - 3000MHz band of the 300GHz spectrum due to propagation and equipment feasibility, rendering spectrum finite and constrained since virtually all radio-frequency (RF) spectrum is licensed. Cognitive radio (CR), a novel approach, sharing unoccupied spectrum by secondary users (SUs) while minimising interference to satisfy service (QoS) of PUs. The paper provides basis for exploiting the Uganda´s spectrum sharing guideline and generally CR in Uganda. Maker ere University in Kampala, the capital, is chosen as a representative busy environment. The spectrum usage in shows relatively high utilisation in the FM, TV and mobile bands with high underutilisation of RF spectrum, for the Ugandan indoor and outdoor radio environment over a week. Further measures and statistics including channel occupancy/vacancy statistics, channel utilization from spectrum detected above the power threshold per band, are compared to other cities. Analysis of temporally freed TV bands is also presented.