Objectives of frequency regulation

(1) The objectives of frequency regulation are 1. the efficient management of frequencies for telecommunications networks and services in the Federal Republic of Germany, in accordance with section 2, having regard to the fact that frequencies are a public good of high social, cultural, economic, security, and defence-policy value; 2. frequency allocation, use of frequencies, and frequency assignment in accordance with objective, transparent, competition-promoting, non-discriminatory, and proportionate criteria; 3. compliance with the relevant international agreements, including the Radio Regulations; and 4. promoting the harmonisation of the use of frequencies for telecommunications networks and services in the European Union, in order to ensure their efficient and interference-free use and to achieve benefits for consumers, such as competition, economies of scale, and the interoperability of services and networks.
(2) In pursuing the objectives referred to in subsection (1), the Federal Network Agency acts in accordance with section 198 and with Decision No 676/2002/EC, in particular by 1. advancing the supply of the Federal Republic of Germany with high-quality, high-performance, area-wide, and uninterrupted wireless voice and data services for all end users, and in doing so, in particular, advancing broadband coverage and usable service quality in rural areas, and ensuring, as far as possible by 2026, continuous, uninterrupted access for all end users to voice and broadband data services of public mobile communications at least along federal trunk roads and also on the subordinate road network and along all rail and waterways; 2. facilitating the rapid development of new wireless communication technologies and applications in the European Union, where appropriate also by way of a cross-sectoral approach; 3. ensuring predictability and consistency, in the interest of long-term investment, in granting, renewing, amending, restricting, and withdrawing frequency assignments; 4. taking appropriate preventive and remedial measures to avoid cross-border or national harmful interference; 5. promoting the shared use of frequencies through similar or different uses of frequencies, in accordance with competition law; 6. applying the most appropriate type of assignment under section 91, involving the least possible burden, so that frequencies are used as flexibly, jointly, and efficiently as possible; 7. applying rules for granting, transferring, renewing, amending, and withdrawing rights of use of frequencies that are laid down clearly and transparently, to ensure legal certainty, consistency, and predictability of regulation; and 8. working towards frequency assignments in the European Union being made in a consistent and predictable manner with regard to protecting the population from health impairment by electromagnetic fields, having regard to Council Recommendation 1999/519/EC of 12 July 1999 on the limitation of exposure of the general public to electromagnetic fields (0 Hz to 300 GHz) (OJ L 199, 30.7.1999, p. 59).