More than 520 homes and businesses in Glenfarg are able to connect to high-speed fibre broadband thanks to the £428M Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband programme.

The Digital Scotland team celebrated fibre availability in the Perth and Kinross village of Glenfarg this week as they visited a fibre street cabinet that serves part of the local area. They were joined by Kevin Macleod -from Scottish family entertainers FUNBOX who lives in Glenfarg - and Councillor Kathleen Baird.

The Glenfarg premises are among around 41,800 homes and businesses across Perth and Kinross that are now able to access fibre broadband through the Digital Scotland rollout.

Other areas in Perth and Kinross to benefit from the Digital Scotland rollout, led by the Scottish Government, include parts Blair Atholl, Bridge of Earn, Inchmichael, Little Dunkeld, Caputh, Glenalmond, Kinrossie, Spittalfield. More local coverage will follow as engineers from Openreach Scotland's digital network business continue work on the ground.

Local people can check the Digital Scotland website - scotlandsuperfast.com - to find out if they are able to access the latest fibre broadband technology. People need to sign up with an internet service provider, as upgrades are not automatic.

Kevin Macleod who took time out of rehearsals for their upcoming DINOSAUR SAFARI show at Perth Concert Hall on Sunday (12th August), said: "It was a pleasure to join the Digital Scotland team to celebrate the availability of fibre broadband in Glenfarg this week. It's good to see this project reaching more communities and giving an increasing number of homes and businesses, like FUNBOX, the chance to connect to high-speed broadband. Similar to our show it's going to be 'roarsome' to have high speed internet access in Glenfarg."

Councillor Kathleen Baird, Vice-Convener of Perth & Kinross Council's Environment and Infrastructure Committee said: "It's fantastic to see an increasing number of communities in Perth and Kinross have access to superfast fibre broadband. Whether you have a small business or are just keeping in touch with friends, having access to high speed fibre broadband is extremely beneficial."

Fibre broadband offers fast and reliable broadband connections at speeds of up to 80Mbps1 and there are many suppliers in the marketplace to choose from. Whether you own a business, work from home or want to keep in touch with friends and family, fibre broadband enables multiple users to connect to the internet at high speeds and get better, faster access to online services. 

Sara Budge, Programme Director for Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband, said: "It's fantastic news that the programme has been able to benefit residents and businesses in and around Glenfarg.

"I would like to thank Kevin from Funbox and Councillor Kathleen Baird for joining us to celebrate fibre broadband availability in the area and I am glad to see that it has been able to benefit the local community."

Digital Scotland funding partners include the Scottish Government, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, BT Group, the UK Government through Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK), local authorities and the European Regional Development Fund. BT Group is investing £126 million in the rollout, and the total project value includes around £18 million which is being reinvested back in to the programme as a result of stronger than expected take-up.

Robert Thorburn, Openreach fibre partnership director for Scotland, said: "Thousands of people and businesses across Perth and Kinross now have the opportunity to access their best-ever broadband speeds when they sign up with a service provider.

"Industry regulator Ofcom has highlighted that many consumers could be accessing significantly faster speeds by upgrading2, and I'd urge local people to check if they're able to order the high-speed services that are now widely available across Scotland."

Further information is also available on Twitter @ScotSuperfast or Facebook at www.facebook.com/scotlandsuperfast

1 and 2 These are the top wholesale speeds available over the Openreach networks to all service providers; speeds offered by service providers may vary.

2 FTTP is capable of delivering the fastest residential broadband speeds in the UK up to 1Gbps. That's around 24 times the UK average speed of 44Mbps (according to Ofcom) and enough to stream 200 HD Netflix movies simultaneously, based on Netflix internet connection speed requirements.