Rural areas across Northern Ireland are to benefit from a new £165 million broadband roll-out scheme.

Project Stratum, the Department for the Economy (DfE) scheme, will improve connectivity for those unable to access broadband services of at least 30 Mbps.

Around 98,000 premises, primarily rural, are eligible for the scheme.

Announcing the launch of the procurement, Permanent Secretary Noel Lavery said: "The additional £150million broadband funding allows us to build on the broadband connectivity achievements to date, given that some 108,000 premises have benefitted from recent interventions. I do recognise, however, that there remain many rural areas across Northern Ireland where broadband access remains unsatisfactory and that this is continuing to have an impact on citizens and businesses within our rural communities. The roll-out of Project Stratum, including additional assistance of £15million from the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, will help ensure that more people than ever in rural areas have access to good quality broadband.

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"All the premises eligible for inclusion in Project Stratum will be published soon, however the precise number and location of those that will benefit from the project will not be known until the procurement process is complete and a contract has been awarded. My Department will seek to maximise any industry contribution, over and above the £165million public investment, to ensure that as many premises as possible benefit from the project.    

"As Project Stratum aims to address the harder-to-reach, and therefore most costly, premises, it is unlikely that we will be able to provide a solution for the full intervention area with the available funding, which is one of the reasons why industry contribution will be vital. The Department continues to engage with DCMS and Local Authorities to ensure that Northern Ireland benefits from national programmes, aimed at addressing the most remote rural premises, in line with UK Government policy emerging from the Future Telecoms Infrastructure Review."

Suppliers have until 3pm on 21 August to return a selection questionnaire for procurement.

More information can be found on the eTendersNI portal.