Cuba will extend digital television transmissions to over 60 percent of Cuban residents starting Saturday thanks to Chinese technology.

There will be 62 transmitters across the country, including the first 34 erected in 2014, said Justo Moreno, director of RadioCuba, the state-owned agency in charge of radio and TV transmissions.

Cuba is to make digital transmissions universal in the country by 2016.

Digital television made its debut in Cuba in June 2013, with 45,000 households in Havana receiving it for a free trial. Now, over 7 million Cubans could access digital TV.

To make this technological switch, Cuba chose the Chinese norm of Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcast, considered as the most beneficial for the objectives and needs of the country, according to Glauco Guillen, director general of Cuba's Institute of Telecommunications Investigation and Development.

Cuban engineers have also developed a new digital television with Chinese technology, known as ATEC-HAIER, which guarantees the new digital transmissions.

In the first stage of the roll-out, the analog and digital systems will coexist to facilitate the progressive adoption of digital technology. The analog system will be abandoned by 2021.