The tower has been a long time coming for local residents, with Member for New England Barnaby Joyce coming out of sick leave to cut the ribbon at the official ceremony alongside Telstra area general manager Mike Marom.

“This is an important moment for residents, businesses and visitors in Dungowan who can now make, receive mobile calls and access high speed mobile broadband using Telstra’s latest 3G and 4GX services,” Mr Marom said.

The new base tower comes equipped with 5G technology capabilities, and is one of 400 that Telstra has delivered under the federal government’s $220 million Mobile Black Spot program, as well as 170 4G small cells.

“So far, more than 60 million calls have been made and more than 2,500 terabytes of data have been downloaded thanks to these new base stations, showing how important connectivity is to regional and remote communities,” Mr Marom said.

“As well as delivering immediate benefits to the community, the new mobile base station at Dungowan readies the area for future rollouts of new technologies, such as 5G.”

A similar base station was also unveiled at Koreelah near Tenterfield. 

Minister for Regional Communications, Bridget McKenzie said after three rounds of funding, the black spot program is now delivering 867 base stations across Australia, representing a Commonwealth commitment of $220 million and a total investment of $680 million.