Global digital divide

The term "digital gap" describes the disparity between those who can access and use digital resources and technologies, as well as their lack of financial means, compared to those who can and can't (ICT). The gap between those who have access to quick Internet connections, cutting-edge computing devices, and current, pertinent information and those who do not is evident. The benefits of ICT also include economic and societal advancements that boost productivity and change industries.
"57% of the world's population does not have access to broadband Internet," the United Nations Broadband Commission reported in 2015. 'populations and billions of people reside in developing countries as of 2015 90 percent of the people in world’s poorest states did not have access to broadband Internet.

2015 report by National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) reveals that 75 percent of the people in the United States have access to the Internet. Mentioned documents indicate as well that there is a disparity in the use of the Internet among the rural and urban dwellers. Among the causes of disparity in the use of the Internet are income and education level.

Digital divide is a multi-faceted problem. The complexity of the digital gap is demonstrated by the existence of technology gap within a country (domestic digital divide) and between countries (international divide).

The divide is manifested by the gap between those who own gadgets to facilitate access such as computers and smartphones and those lacking similar devices. It is also characterized by aspects such as variation in facilities of communication, capacity to transmit information, the number of people using computers and the number of network hosting, if regard the problem globally.

International digital divide presents a significant barrier to the economic prosperity of developing nations. The current economy thrives on information with Information Communication Technology playing a critical role in enhancing efficiency in production and business operation. Other roles of ICT include promoting competitiveness and innovations.

Raven, Huang and Kim (2007) noted that the developing nations faced several obstacles in the use of the Internet, e-business and e-commerce. These barriers include insignificant commercial network demand, resulting in and from low levels of income, and poor infrastructural facilities attributed to inadequate government intervention. Passive engagement in information economy prevents developing nations from enjoying the benefits associated with the use of digital technology.

The growing use of the Internet has made it a platform for delivering crucial services; however, the variation in the accessibility, especially in the developing countries, among the populations makes it a social problem. Many institutions and businesses in the world have adopted the use of websites in offering their services. Such institutions include schools that have adopted online learning, businesses using online selling, hospitals, banks. An information gap is created by the fact that citizens are divided into those with access to data and those who cannot access the online facilities. However, the disparity could be addressed through improving the literacy level, developing the infrastructure, provision of electricity in rural areas in developing countries, among other aspects.

Data Validity and Reliability

Data used for the purposes of this paper have been extracted from various sources such as the International Trade Union (ITU), the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), and Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC). The ITU and the UNDP are international organizations and the data contained in their websites is reliable and valid, written by professionals, therefore, its consistency and validity are undisputed. PWC is a renowned international research company that has participated in numerous large-scale global research work therefore, their data is profound and extensive.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Digital Divide in Education

Digital divide in education examines the gap in adopting the use of technology in the educational sector and the knowledge slit created. According to the study carried out by Losh (2009), education is an important pillar of the society and it is required for innovation and development in each economic sector. This public field also dictates social mobility of individuals. Technology, on the other hand, is inseparable from education. Use of innovations both at the classroom level and by individual students in performing their tasks enables learners to relate to the workings of the outside world (Harris, 2015). Technology allows learners to develop knowledge and skills necessary to tackle future real-world problems.

Out of the estimated 7.6 billion of world population, only 34 percent have Internet access capabilities. It translates to 4.2 billion individuals who are yet to experience the digital revolution (West, 2015). The number indicated can also be related to learning institutions that are not privileged to use digital means in offering their studies. Therefore, the knowledge gained by the students would be considered not up-to-date or rather not as useful because of the limitations existing in some countries of today’s digital world.

Digital Divide in HealthCare

The health sector, through improving medical conditions of a nation’s workforce, plays an important role in the growth of an economy. A healthy nation ensures continual productivity thus facilitating economic growth and development. Healthcare is also among the most dynamic industries with new discoveries made each day on treatment and provision of better services. Healthcare facilities, therefore, require access to reliable information for the systems to work efficiently.

In 2015, Price Waterhouse Coopers conducted a research on digital divide focusing their study on healthcare. The results showed that healthcare industry was among the leading consumers of information and the access to ICT was a key factor in improving the provision of services. Healthcare sector embracing the digital age is beneficial to both consumers and medical providers. General public can get information about their health condition; access to medical application and smart medical devices. Practitioners in the sector can provide individualized treatments to patients, monitor their conditions no matter the location, and provide timely advice. In developed countries, 49% of health consumers report improvement in treatment practices through the use of technology. Markedly, visits to medical centers has significantly reduced by 59% as information is available to health consumers (Alyoubi 2015) Provided arguments show how important ICT is to individuals in any part of the world. If integration of technological innovations is fully realized and the problem of the gap of social divide closed, significant health costs can be reduced.

Other Studies

According to Clarke, Milner, Killer, and Dixon, (2008) "…the underlying concerns surrounding the issue of the digital divide are actually more about the nature and future of education than about the current distribution of technology." Authors further assert that the people in the less developed countries face educational and literacy barriers to accessing information in the Internet. According to the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), a United States Government agency created to control interstate communications, Julius Genachowski, “if you cannot get online, you cannot compete in the digital economy”. UNDP report (2001) suggested that 25 nations have less than 1 telephone line per 100 people. 20 of these nations are African. Generally, one billion people in the world still do not have telephone lines. Businesses in such deprived of innovations nations suffer from technological disadvantages and are mostly outcompeted in the global market as a result. Lack of proper infrastructure such as electricity, computers and telephone lines (necessary facilities in instituting digital technology) worsens the problem of digital divide.

CHALLENGES AND OBSTACLES

Disparity in the Internet Use

The disparity in the application of the Internet is one of the factors contributing to the division in digital technology sphere overall. Castells (2011) has used figures from varied sources to show that the worldwide patterns of inequality in the Internet use reflect the wider pattern of access to earlier information communication technologies. The disparity rules-out the Internet as a tool giving everyone a chance to be heard and gain information. Technological advancements in the delivery of public service through the Internet, mostly in developing nations, have lagged behind due to the global digital divide.

Reports indicate that the well-off population in the developed countries are more likely to achieve success attributed to technological advancement while the less privileged representatives from developing countries gain little to no benefits. Conversely, the Internet is of minimal use to a section of 20% of the global population who have low literacy levels (Van Dijk, 2017). In other corners of the world women are marginalized and consequently denied the chance to go online hence widening the digital divide gap.

Language Barrier

The internet lacks information provision in some languages. Such barrier poses a communicational issue and presents a challenge to those who use rare languages solely. Most of the websites in the Internet are created and written in English. “By the year 2000, only 20% of all websites in the world were visible to the world in languages other than English, and most of these were in Japanese, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Chinese”. Contrastingly, most of the people in the less developed nations do not understand English. As such, overcoming this barrier requires that the websites are translated into local languages. “Less than ten percent of people are English-literate while the rest, more than two billion, speak languages that are sparsely represented on the Web” (Ellison, 2007).

Translation of the Internet available content into all languages is yet to be fully actualized. Second languages have less translated content than the original form. For instance, German editions translated to English, despite comprising the largest part, only amounts to 51% of the total content that is available (Ellison, 2007). Therefore, the limit of a certain language’s online content in turn limits the population of many countries to access information. Such issues widen the digital divide gap as well.

Electricity Problem

The absence of electricity in most areas of the underdeveloped countries has continued to limit the use of the Internet. Markedly, powering of computers and use of the Internet requires electricity and the reliable source of power. Majority of the people in poor countries do not have access to electricity grids. According to Vickery (2011), about 70 percent of the people living in rural areas of Africa are not connected to the grid and 85 percent of the people in some Indian states do not have electricity.

Infrastructure

The absence of facilitating infrastructure to the Internet application in the less developed countries has demotivated the efforts of websites translations into r region-specific languages. As a result, the disparity in digital technology use continues to widen.

Countries with proficient infrastructure are able to invest in development of ICT systems. However, developing countries face hardships in the Internet access due to poor infrastructure. The presence of a proper technological institutions base determines the accessibility of vital products and services that are required to improve the development of any country.

Further, aggravating problem of disparity in the digital technology use arises from the amount of funds needed to acquire the necessary equipment and infrastructure. Poor performing economy problems, alongside the financial difficulties in less developed countries, provide a major setback to the efforts of bridging the digital communication gap. According to some researches, bridging the divide requires an estimated colossal sum of 1.5 trillion dollars to establish the necessary infrastructure that facilitate digital platform in China, India, Southern Africa, and Brazil (Baskaran, & Muchie, 2006). Meeting these costs has an effect of worsening countries’ foreign debt statuses.

ICT requires heavy investment in infrastructure both from the government and private entities. The state is responsible for laying the necessary structures as the provision of electricity, enabling business environment, and human resource development among others to make it possible to attract investors. Developing nations are risky ventures for investors who normally avoid doing business in such nations. In addition, the governments of the countries lack the necessary resources to establish their own ICT frameworks and largely depend on donors to fund innovative projects. The digital divide in Africa and other developing countries is exacerbated by the main use of satellites. Paralleled to fibre optic, extensively lacking in the continent, satellites use is costlier.

In general, rural versus urban infrastructure that facilitates individual’s internet utilization, represent a similar trend around the globe. Those in urban areas are privileged with better network connections, search engines, and access to various websites. Their higher informative gains as compared to those in rural areas continue to widen the digital divide. When someone from the rural areas in the developing nation wants to access the Internet, the person may face the challenge of travelling for long distance to cities because of poor infrastructure in local areas. Public services such as the banking systems in some parts of the world are still delivered manually and with their few available automated machines the provision is inefficient. Therefore, the infrastructure standards in both urban or rural areas will determine the type of services provided.

Costs

Internet usage needs numerous connections and the process of establishing them may appear costly. Internet Service Provider (ISP) firms are responsible for providing the Internet services. Private companies also invest heavily in telecommunications and in offering the Internet services. Individuals who require the access need to contact the ISP for information on the requirements necessary to link the devices to the Internet. As part of the requirement, in most cases one has to pay installation fees and additional charges related to buying specific gadgets such as modems or routers. In addition, there are usage charges that are payable based on certain criteria either monthly or per amount of data consumed. The most affected countries are the developing ones, where the Internet charges are outrageously high.

The high cost of the Internet is one of the factors that leads to the disparity in the use of digital technology. An average user of the Internet in the United States incurs the cost of about 1.2 percent of his or her monthly income. The monthly cost of internet in Sri Lanka accounts for 60 percent of monthly income. In Bangladesh, the cost stays at the rate of 191 percent of an average Bangladesh monthly income. The costs in Nepal and Madagascar are 278 percent and 614 percent respectively, according to UNDP (2015) data, whereas the investment constitutes much less than one month's salary for a European. Another factor that arises in the digital disparity is the inequity in the distribution of the technology between the disadvantaged in the society and the high-income earners. In some cases countries that have used the principle of distributive justice in the resource allocation have failed to use the same principle in digital technology distribution.

Ethical Outcomes

Though economic and cultural barriers present the main setbacks, in attempting to bridge the gap in digital technology, the issue that should be addressed, there are associated ethical outcomes that need attention as well. Majority of the people in the less developed countries and all states by extension would want to access the Internet. However, the attempts to overcome the digital divide in some undemocratic countries may be short-lived. Some autocratic governments would not want to get citizens of their countries connected to the Internet as there are strict censorship rules and control of information acquired via the Internet.

The government, especially in the developing nations, may hesitate to bridge the digital divide gaps for the fear of culture erosion. Africa nations, particularly, uphold their traditional values and exposure of its populations to the modern internet world would as perceived, lead to the adoption of unethical practices. The most influential platform has been social media.

POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS

Efforts of the United Nations to prioritize and create an international Information and Communications Technologies body can help reduce the digital divide. According to Schradie (2011), there is a need for the department to educate the member-states, through global summits, regarding the implication of digital divide. The UN and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a United States agency that is liable for problems concerning ICT, undertake roles such as setting accounting rates, outlining regulations on telecommunication, and setting international standards. By doing so, the two bodies would ascertain commitment of nations towards bridging the gap in digital technology that is in accordance with the 2017 OECD report. In this respect, the efforts of a nation to invest in the costly information communication technology would be futile and not a misplacement of priorities. A viable investment would be to concurrently done in the field such as education or holding literacy promoting programs alongside the ICT projects.

Provision of education, awareness campaigns and programs geared at improving the use of digital technology would play an important role in narrowing the digital divide. Other projects that aim at reducing the cost of digital technology would also be helpful in bridging the gap and ensuring wide usage of the technology. The problem associated with financial resources required to set up the necessary infrastructure for the Internet can be addressed through partnerships. Private-public partnership is useful in solving this problem. The government, in this case, plays a role in empowering its people to appreciate the value of the technology as well as encouraging citizens in embracing innovations.

Adoption of methods that lower cost of the Internet would be helpful in bridging the digital gap in the society. Wireless networks are cheaper internet access alternative. CAPEX (capital expenditures) efficiency in mobile phones can be attained through programming to enable network sharing between operators. OPEX (operating expenditures) efficiency can be ensured through lowering power consumption or remote systems upgrade. Manufacturers of equipment should, therefore, be advised to factor in the rural areas constraints and, consequently, come up with models that have low power consumption rates. Such a move would considerably reduce the cost of the Internet access and help in enabling the rural dwellers to access the Internet and reduce the global issues of the gap in digital technology.

As the rest of the world strives to help in improving the infrastructure issues, the governments of less developed countries in question should also take all necessary possible steps on their parts, particularly regarding the electricity problem. First, the governments could focus on large-scale electricity generation projects. There is need to channel efforts on more than one scheme and project hence, solving a part of the causes of a digital divide. Launching the projects could be achieved in fast manner by laying policies that would set prices in the energy sector that are encouraging and attractive to private investors.

Secondly, in the quest to overcome digital divide, the respective governments could consider enhancing transmission coverage. It would be important to separate the generation of electricity and the transmission fees. While the generation sector handling would be left solely to the government, the transmission should be charged to private investors. This strategy would precipitate the supply of electricity to population centers and rural areas (Epstein, Nisbet, & Gillespie 2011).

Also, encouraging nations to adopt digital technology initiation ideas together with the incentives such as inspiring the population’s proficiency in languages represented primarily in the Internet would help in overcoming the digital divide.

CONCLUSION

Overcoming digital divide cannot be possible if the reforms are not taken in respective governments in developing nations regarding such issues as infrastructure, education or literacy, electricity. Attempts to bridge digital divide presents an opportunity for authorities to carry out extensive changes with regard to their education policies, infrastructure projects, namely power supply. Even though embracing information communication technology does not solve all the social and economic problems world nations face, it can bring about sufficient positive results Through the improvement of information exchange, each society can benefit from the consequential ease of transacting trade and the expanded markets for businesses.











References

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