Global phone access improves as Internet gap widens — ITU

ISTANBUL, Turkey – The latter half of the 1990s saw the sharpest rise globally in the rate of telecommunication network growth since the 1950s, while investment in infrastructure exceeded $200 billion in 2000. However, while the gap between developed and developing countries in telephone lines is closing, a divide is opening up in the availability and quality of Internet access.

Regulators have a critical role to play in bridging the digital divide by creating a climate conducive to enhanced investment and diffusion of services. However, this can only be achieved if they are given the right tools and resources to become effective: a firm mandate and clear goals, sufficient human and financial resources, adequate enforcement powers, organizational flexibility and timely decision-making.

According to Yoshio Utsumi, secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), "governments and regulators have an ongoing responsibility to ensure universal access to telecommunications. They must also strive to make the technology and the services reasonably priced."

Landmark reports

Two landmark reports being launched by the ITU at its Third World Telecommunication Development Conference in Istanbul, Turkey – World Telecommunication Development Report 2002: Reinventing Telecoms and Trends in Telecommunication Reform 2002: Effective Regulation – pinpoint the key issues for telecommunication planners and best practices for regulators in the new telecommunication environment.

"The ITU is responding to the needs of the sector with two state-of-the-art reports," said Hamadoun Touré, director of the ITU’s Telecommunication Development Bureau (BDT). "In a new, more sober environment in telecommunication, these two reports point the way for planners to reinvent access to services and for regulators to reinforce themselves to face the challenges of the moment."

The latest World Telecommunication Development Report (WTDR 2002) shows that access to the Internet is harder to measure. "The new digital divide is not just about the number of access lines, but also about the quality of the experience, as evidenced, for example, by the availability of IP connectivity," says Tim Kelly, head of ITU’s Strategy and Policy Unit and co-author. "The greater the bandwidth, the quicker the response time."

LDCs’ performance

One notable development is that the world’s least developed countries (LDCs) surpassed the important threshold of one telephone subscriber per 100 inhabitants in the year 2001 and now have the world’s fastest growing networks, due in large part to competition in mobile cellular markets.

"Moving beyond traditional measures, such as the number of phone lines per 100 inhabitants, WTDR 2002 proposes new targets depending on a nation’s level of economic development. This includes 50 percent penetration for Internet access in developed nations and 90 percent coverage by mobile service in developing ones," says Michael Minges, head of ITU’s Data and Statistics Unit and co-author of WTDR 2002.

The report also demonstrates, through the use of country case studies, that the difference between fast and super-fast network growth is often the quality and timing of reform.

Regulators hold the key to facilitating investment flows into the sector and enabling the benefits of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to be dispersed as widely as possible. From a mere 13 countries in 1990, now some 115 countries, or over 60 percent of ITU’s member-states, have created a regulatory body.

Government guidance

However, simply declaring telecommunications "competitive" does not ensure that any new market entrants would, or could, actually begin competing. Government guidance and action has been found necessary in nearly every country to nurture competition and the need for regulatory expertise has become more, not less, acute.

"The effectiveness of the regulator is closely related to his or her credibility and independence," explains Doreen Bogdan, regulatory officer in ITU’s Sector Reform Unit and co-author of Trends 2000.

"There is no blueprint or national precedent for how regulators could achieve effectiveness and independence. However, this report shows that there are remarkable similarities in the issues that all governments face when they attempt to establish effective regulatory regimes," she adds.

"Increasingly, governments are realizing that the value of their national ICT assets is linked to the strength of their sector reform programs," says Susan Schorr, also an ITU regulatory officer and co-author of Trends 2002.

"The growth in the number of ICT service subscribers worldwide continues to swell, and for the most part, these services are provided in a competitive framework that requires effective regulators to ensure fair and transparent market rules," she explains.