July 1999
The Internet has huge potential to promote development and eradicate poverty, but is not available to those who most need it. In fact, the Net society is creating two divergent communications systems - one for those with income, literacy and connections; the other for those without connections, blocked by high barriers of time, cost, uncertainty and out-of-date information. These are among the conclusions of the recent 1999 Human Development Report from the United Nations. In the first of its annual reports to focus on the impact of new technology, the UN Development Programme (UNDP) says that more than half of the GDP in the major OECD countries is now knowledge-based.
Knowledge at the core of the quest for economic success seems an attractive leveller, with unfettered access; ease of distribution; low costs and relative lack of regulation. But the report's authors insist that the world is being polarised into the connected and the isolated, classified as the 'know and the know-nots'. 'The collapse of space, time and borders may be creating a global village, but not everyone can be a citizen. The global, professional elite now faces low borders, but billions of others find borders as high as ever,' the report says.
Predicting an increase in the number of Internet users to 700 million in 2001, the UNDP points to the fact that OECD countries, with only one-fifth of the world's population, have 91 per cent of all Internet users. While one-quarter of all Americans and 14 per cent of the Irish population have access to the Internet, only 0.1 per cent of the population of Sub-Saharan Africa is online.
Even in terms of basic telecommunications, the developing world still has a long way to go. As South Africa's President, Thabo Mbeki has memorably noted: 'Half of humanity has never made a telephone call.' In Cambodia in 1996, there was under one telephone per 100 people. As we enter the 21st century, one quarter of countries still do not have one telephone per 100 people.
In some African countries, average monthly Internet connection and use costs as much as dollars 100 - compared with dollars 10 in the US. Yet even if telecommunications systems are installed and accessible, without literacy and basic computer skills people will have little access to the network society.
Growth of the Internet is also being deliberately stunted by government censorship and restrictions on access, particularly in the less progressive countries. The latest report from Human Rights Watch singles out the governments of Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Bahrain, Iran and the United Arab Emirates for criticism in blocking access to websites. Iraq and Libya are not even linked to the Internet. 'Authorities in this region are used to keeping tight reigns on the media. Instead of erecting barriers that cannot stand for long, these governments should work to make online communication widely available,' says Hanny Megally, Human Rights Watch's director for the Middle East and North Africa.
Unless things change dramatically, the typical Internet user is likely to remain an urban-based, college-educated male, under 35 years old and English-speaking. Market forces alone will not rectify the imbalance, the UNDP warns. In contrast to this rather bleak outlook, an international agency specialising in information for development, the Panos Institute, believes that the Internet sector in poorer countries is now highly competitive. 'If the market is ensuring rapid Internet growth, donors and NGOs [non-governmental organisations] may need to focus on ensuring access and benefits for the less advantaged,' it says.
However, most agencies acknowledge that funding must be generated. The report suggests the introduction of a 'bit tax' on data sent through the Internet. A tax of one US cent on every 100 emails of over 10k in size it suggests, could generate well over dollars 70 million a year.
One of only very few concrete recommendations made in the report, the 'bit tax' has already been a source of embarrassment to the UNDP. In response to criticism, UNDP administrator Mark Malloch Brown said: 'UNDP is not engaged now, nor does it plan to engage in the future, in any activity to implement or impose such taxation schemes on any person or group.'
Increasingly, governments are looking to the private sector for investment. In the Philippines, new mobile phone operators are required to install 400,000 landlines serving poor communities within five years.
At the heart of efforts to make the Internet widely available is the provision of community access points, says the UNDP. Estonia has managed to 'tiger-leap' ahead of other transition economies by investing heavily in public access areas and information-based learning systems. It now ranks among the top 15 countries in Europe in computers per capita.
The report also recommends reinforcing ethnic languages and cultures via the creation of local content. In India, the government of Tamil Nadu has launched a programme to promote websites in Tamil, spoken by 75 million people worldwide.
Despite the reluctance of the report to suggest alternatives, it is not alone in warning that it may not be enough to throw money at developing technology infrastructures, when there are more basic needs to be satisfied. The Panos Institute asks: 'How important is Internet access in an area without safe water or even an affordable telephone service?'
So far, development agencies and NGOs have been prioritising needs on a case-by-case basis. 'This kind of development strategy should be decided by local people and workers on the ground, we are not interested in parachuting technological infrastructure into an area which has more pressing needs,' says Mark Lynas of the human rights and development network, oneworld.net
For the moment, many would take the broader view held by Mark Lynas: that the chaotic nature of the Internet makes it a powerful communication tool in empowering socially excluded and marginal groups. 'The Internet is currently most useful for NGOs in the developing world who are using it to get their message across,' he says.
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