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TECHNOLOGY
ACHARA ASHAYAGACHAT
Asia Pacific countries still have disparities in internet access despite rapid growth of mobile phone subscriptions, according to a study by the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (Escap).
Escap today will conclude a three-day meeting in Bangkok on how to overcome the "digital divide" with experts from governments, academia, the UN and other international agencies, as well as businesses such as Microsoft.
The Escap study showed that both telephone and internet use have increased dramatically in the region; the number of mobile phone subscribers has increased by nearly 70 times in South Asia between 2000 and 2007, and by over 40 times in Central Asia.
In Southeast Asia, which has a relatively more developed market, the number of subscribers still grew by about 10 times. Yet the growth is the fastest in the poorest countries in the region. The least developed countries as a group have seen their mobile phone user totals increase by close to 80 times.
By contrast, the gap between rich and poor nations in internet access has widened over the same period. At the top end, the five most connected countries - New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Malaysia - had between 55% and 80% of their populations with access to the internet by 2007.
For the bottom five - Burma, Timor-Leste, Tajikistan, Bangladesh and Cambodia - less than one percent of the population uses the internet. The average for the Asia-Pacific region is 20%.
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