Developing World Urged To Put Resources Into Internet

"There is no way developing countries should sit back and wait, because online activities are driving offline activities," Joe Mucheru, head of Google in Sub-Saharan Africa, told delegates at the Internet Governance Forum in Nairobi.

The IGF is a U.N. sponsored organization that meets, "in order to foster the sustainability, robustness, security, stability and development of the Internet." The IGF met in Nairobi in September, 2011 to discuss the "Internet as a catalyst for change: access, development, freedoms and innovation".

While delegates agreed that the Internet could grow economies of the poorer nations, the reality is that only 21 percent of residents of the developing world have access to any Internet, compared with 69 percent of the richer nations. Because the Internet is a global system, developing countries need robust connections to the larger world, as well as infrastructure in their own countries.

According to one news report, Bitange Ndemo, of Kenya's ministry of communication, said that "the answer lies in the construction of a national fiber network to take capacity brought on submarine cables to homes and businesses."

"I ask you to make (access) to this resource (high-speed Internet) a human rights issue," Ndemo told participants at the meeting. "If access to broadband is declared a human rights issue, then governments will step in and invest so no human being is left behind."

Poor nations urged to tap Web fast for growth (Reuters, Sept. 30, 2011)

About the Internet Governance Forum (IGF Website)

Internet Governance Forum report (September, 2011)