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UN Tech Group Finds Most Expensive Broadband
destinyland writes "In the Central African Republic, broadband internet service costs 3891% of the average monthly income. 'Put another way, a month's broadband service costs more than three years' average wages in the country,' notes one technology blog, 'compared with less than two hours' earnings in Macau.' A United Nations' technology group released the figures in a new report in advance of a September 19 summit on the digital divide in developing countries. ('We are trying to avoid a broadband divide,' said Dr. Hamadoun Toure, the secretary general of the UN's International Telecommunications Union.) Their agency noted that the rate for broadband penetration is below 1% in many poor countries, with monthly costs higher than the average monthly income. 'By contrast,' notes the BBC, 'in the world's most developed economies, around 30% of people have access to broadband at a cost of less than 1% of their income.' And the report also estimates that there are 5 billion cellphones in the world — though some people may own more than one."
"And the report also estimates that there are 5 billion cellphones in the world — though some people may own more than one."
Yeah -- I'm pretty sure that worldwide ownership rate of cell phones is somewhat less than 73%.
It's going to be pretty difficult to proliferate anything through much of Africa with ultracorrupt asshats running many of the countries, not to mention other ultracorrupt asshats trying to overthrow the current ultracorrupt asshats in power. You'd think that they'd stop caring about goddamned broadband and start worrying about actually getting a stable infrastructure first. Yes, I realize that the guys talking about broadband are part of a subgroup within a much broader one, but still, focus on what you can actually accomplish, not something that's going to take a lot more work in other areas to become even remotely feasible.
Then again, Nigeria seems to be doing just fine with internet access...
I don't think it's at all fair to compare prices based on average monthly income in a country. If the average income is mere dollars per day or per month, how can you possibly expect internet access to be within means? It's like complaining that the average New Yorker/Manhattanite can't afford a car because the parking costs almost as much as their rent!
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Have they checked the rates in Canada?
Okay, so all kidding aside it's not 3891% of the average monthly income, but it sure as hell is a lot more than "less than 1% of our income".
3891% of the average monthly income
Given that the monthly income is roughly $50, I doubt a lack of broadband is what keeps them up at night.
There are many things more accessible in the developed world than the developing world. Oh, such as food, clean water, medicine, clothing, shelter, literacy-level education.
Yes, broadband is nice, and (in developed) countries plays a role at improving human rights (through emporewment of individual citizens to read and share information, both through official channels and outside them).
But in the poorest countries, things are different. Massively accessible broadband would not improve jack squat until people can actually read and write, until they are not dying of hunger and disease. Any investing in broadband infrastructure would be a money hole which would only benefits the pockets of those in power (who undoubtedly will take a graft in exchange for permission of setting up the infrastructure).
Solve the basics, like food and water, before you go hi-tech, mmmk?
Thank you, Captain Obvious.
Countries with devastating poverty have a lot of people who can't afford broadband internet for the computer they can't afford to own that runs on electricity they don't have in the "house" that we wouldn't consider a house.
Perhaps we should start with something more basic, like access to clean water, absence of marauding militias, a level of education somewhere above shockingly bad, etc.
"Greetings Friend. I represent the estate of the recently deceased Minister of Telecommunications and Internet Services of the Central African Republic. I am writing to request your assistance with a matter involving tansference of a substantial sum of moneys ... "
Obi-Wan: "I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were sudden
Perhaps the developed world should consider that when you can't feed yourself or your family, broadband is not really that high a priority. If you also factor in the illiteracy rate, it becomes even less of a priority. The things these countries need are much more basic and critical to survival. Clean safe water, renewable, self sustained sources of food. To hell with broadband, and I run an ISP.
I don't understand what you mean. Comparing cell phone prices to average income in a country tells you something about effective availability of cell phone communciation in that country. I don't think it's meaningful to say that it's "unfair" to do so. Who is it being unfair to?
Since when did broadband access become a right?
Hell, I think there's probably more detrimental things having to do with broadband access.
You lose your culture -- it is replaced by youtube and pictures of cats with captions.
You lose your intelligence and imagination -- it is replaced by farmville, mafia wars, and 4chan.
Hell, you even lose your literacy.
Then again, I guess it makes it easy for the government to control you that way: here, suck on the teat of the internet and let me take care of all of your problems.
3891% of the average monthly income
Given that the monthly income is roughly $50, I doubt a lack of broadband is what keeps them up at night.
Thank you. You've got people saying things like "We've got to get broadband to the third world so they can catch up!". Broadband? Many of these people don't even have clean water supplies, or a house that isn't made of trash or mud. Just how much is a freakin' broadband connection going to help them?
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Saying "3891% of the average monthly income" without giving an actual price is ignorant and deceptive. It is completely meaningless to measure things this way when income in parts of the world can still be measured in pennies a day. It could very well be (and I suspect it is but don't have meaningful data to determine this) that the broadband cost there is actually less than what I pay. While I do think that it is important that the information on the Internet be available to everyone, and realize that this can help improve things many ways in the most economically depressed areas, it is not realistic to suggest that because wages are low in a country that everything should be given to them at costs that would bankrupt the providers. People who can't afford food or clean water, don't have electricity, and certainly can't afford a computer are not likely to be concerned about Internet services pricing, and if they are then their priorities are wrong.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Well, without getting into too much detail it depends on whether broadband is a tradable or non-tradable good. A tradable good is something like say gold - worth pretty much the same all over the world, because otherwise there'd be arbitrage. A non-tradable good would be something like getting a haircut, which is why most can afford to get haircuts despite living on mere dollars a day. The wages are much lower so the prices are much lower.
A lot of it is equipment, but a lot of it is also people to lay down cables, wire houses, set up wireless antennas, do support, maintenance, configuration, billing and so on. If you didn't take into consideration local costs, you'd reach a lot of crazy conclusions. And regarding the things they do have to buy, it's profit-maximizing to sell cheaper in poor countries than in rich countries as long as it doesn't hurt the other sales. That is why for example you can find a cheap Chinese or Thai-only phone, because it's only usable in that country and won't hurt your US and other English-speaking sales. I'm sure you could make some sort of deal or to purchase obsolete equipment from a western ISP for cheap.
All in all, I think it's better to compare to monthly income because they could probably sell it for considerably less and still break even. A far bigger issue I think is penetration, the cost of building out a network is not linear to the number of people on it. Even if only 20% of a town wants broadband you have to wire almost as much as if 80% would want it. That is why you often se rates in third world countries that are much, much higher than what I get even on an absolute scale, despite that everything should be cheaper to do down there.
At least here in Norway it's about $40 for basic broadband (1-2 Mbit), $60 (1% of average full time income) for medium broadband (5-10 Mbit) while about $80 will get you a top line (20-30 Mbit). Almost everyone who wants it has broadband, which really keeps the costs per customer down. Sure it could probably get even cheaper but compared to many poorer countries we pay little and get a lot. Things like broadband thrive on volume of many people signing up.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
nevermind internet.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Prices in a given place, in relation to the average monthtly income, is all that matters to the poeple in the end...
But even if you want to look at absolute numbers - apparently the average monthly income is in the range of tens of USD. You certainly wouldn't buy broadband at close to 40x of that amount, too. "High tech" stuff, of various kind, is typically most expensive at such places by all conceivable measures..
One that hath name thou can not otter
To quote the article... "Access to broadband should be an universal human right." Hmm , in these African countries, why not first focus on the things that are essential like clean water, healthy food, disease free (or reduced) living facilities before talking about having access to slashdot and cnn as being universal human rights?
Including a small extra fee for access the municipal fiber network, for 1 month of 100/100Mbit with no caps or meters what so ever, I pay roughly 1.5 hours of my wage after taxes.. and I'm just above average for "low income".. I pay almost twice that for unmetered mobile 3G traffic on my phone though.. tethered to the laptop the gigs tend to run away so unmetered is the only way. ;)
As far as I've seen from the latest Akamai state of the internet reports, Scandinavia is losing ground to South Korea and some other quickly rising countries... We'll see.. ;)
Perhaps we should start with something more basic, like access to clean water, absence of marauding militias, a level of education somewhere above shockingly bad, etc.
I, like many others, believe that delivering Internet access to the masses will be what finally enables the citizens of [poor country] to provide food, water, shelter, education, and a stable government for/to themselves.
Well...now that we've given up on costing in dollars, and instead as a percentage of income, all I have to do is raise my income and the cost, of EVERYTHING, goes down.
And that would be about as true as it is unhelpful to know.