A trio of southwest communities are slated for some improved cell service upgrades in the near future.

On Monday, SaskTel announced they will enhance their 4G LTE services in 41 rural communities including Hazlet, Neville, and Sceptre.

Minister Responsible for SaskTel Don Morgan said that the southwest is one area they've put a priority on because there are very few sizeable towns or cities.

"In the southwest, we knew that the demographics are a lot of smaller remote communities that are there that haven't had the benefit of a lot of major highways going through," he said. "So we're trying to make a commitment to try and improve those areas, we want to have better coverage in areas where we didn't have any or little coverage before."

The announcement is part of phase two of Saskatchewan's four-phase initiative to bolster cell and internet services in rural towns and villages.

"In the 1950s we made a decision as a province to provide rural electrification, sometimes it wasn't a really good business decision, but we wanted to say that everyone that had a farm should have light and power and be able to operate," Morgan said. "This is the same kind of thing, cell coverage is sort of one of the fundamentals of making our province a better place."

Now that the announcement has been made, the crown corporation will have to secure land in all of the 41 communities either by purchasing it or being gifted it to place a tower about 30 meters tall for the improved services.

"The criteria that they need for it (to perform the upgrades is), do they have land available, do they have electricity available to power the tower, and thirdly is there a fibre line nearby that they can patch into," he explained.

This batch of communities is expected to have the service available to them no later than March 31, 2020.