Today the European Commission published the results of its Scoreboard on digital progress. The Scoreboard analyses the regulatory and business climate in terms of competition and investment in Europe’s digital technology markets.
The report concludes that Europeans have access to basic digital networks and services, but miss out on the main current and future benefits of the digital revolution, because of problems in Europe's telecoms and wider digital markets.
Further results are:
- Basic Broadband is now virtually everywhere available in Europe. Only 4.5% of the population is not covered by basic broadband and has to rely on satellite technology. Getting better take-up of satellite technology shall bridge the remaining gap.
- 54% of EU citizens have broadband available at speeds greater than 30 Mbps.
- 36% of EU citizens access the Internet via a portable computer or other mobile devices.
- Roaming prices in 2012 have fallen - by almost 5 euro-cents, mainly after the 1st July 2012 Roaming regulation.
- 87% of enterprises use eGovernment and the proportion of citizens using eGovernment has also increased over the last year to 44%.
Problem areas are:
- Only 2% of homes have ultrafast broadband subscriptions (above 100 Mbps), far from the EU's 2020 target of 50%.
- 50% of EU citizens have no or low computer skills – neither the amount nor the level of user skills have improved over the last year.
- Around 100 million EU citizens still have never used the Internet, stating too high costs, lack of interest, or lack of skills as the main barriers. However more and more have tried out the Internet.
Neelie Kroes, Vice-president of the European Commission sees the biggest challenge in the lack of investment in very fast networks, and a continuing lack of a real Single Telecoms Market. Later this year the European Commission will adopt proposals for concrete measures in response to a European Council request to create a Single Telecoms Market, in order to address the problems indicated in today's data.
For more information: http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-13-528_en.htm and http://ec.europa.eu/digital-agenda/en/progress-country
Source: European Commission