The Global Information Society: a Statistical View

1
The Global Information Societya Statistical
View

• 2008 Global Eventon Measuring the Information
  Society
• Geneva, 27-29 May 2008
• Sheridan Roberts

2
Introduction

• This presentation introduces the first major
  statistical publication of the Partnership on
  Measuring ICT for Development
• The Global Information Society a Statistical
  View
• the publication has just been released and
  includes available statistics for the 41 core ICT
  indicators
• data were presented by level of development, with
  some shown by region and some showing change over
  time.
• An important aim of the publication is to show
  data availability and international comparability
  for the core indicators
• another presentation in this meeting addresses
  data comparability and proposes some revisions to
  the core indicators
• this presentation outlines data availability for
  the core indicators, presents the broad content
  of the publication and shows some results.

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Broad structure and content of the Partnership
publication

• Opening material
• preface, acknowledgments, contents
• Chapter 1. Introduction
• objectives, statistical standards for information
  society measurement, the Partnership and its
  activities, regional measurement initiatives.
• Chapters 2 to 5. Data availability and
  statistical summary in respect of
• ICT infrastructure and access
• access to, and use of, ICT by households and
  individuals
• use of ICT by businesses
• the ICT-producing sector and international trade
  in ICT goods.
• Chapter 6. ICT in education
• describes work done on developing new core
  indicators for ICT in education and presents
  information on data availability
• presents some data from a scoping study
  undertaken by UIS.

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Broad structure and content of the Partnership
publication (continued)

• Chapter 7. Measuring the impact of ICT
• describes why measuring the impact of ICT is
  challenging
• briefly explores current work
• includes some data on the impact of ICT on
  educational outcomes
• provides suggestions for further statistical work
  in this area.
• Chapter 8. Conclusions and future work of the
  Partnership
• Annexes
• Known availability of core ICT indicators for
  each economy
• Core indicators on ICT infrastructure and access
• Core indicators on access to, and use of, ICT by
  households and individuals
• Core indicators on the use of ICT by businesses
• Core indicators for the ICT sector and trade in
  ICT goods
• OECD list of ICT goods (2003)
• Bibliography and abbreviations

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Availability of ICT indicators ICT
infrastructure and access

• ICT infrastructure and access (A1A12)
• the indicators are collected by the ITU, mainly
  from telecommunication authorities and some
  operators
• availability of the basic core ICT infrastructure
  and access indicators is quite good (most are
  available for gt three quarters of countries)
• statistics for the two extended core indicators
  (and basic core indicator A10) are less available
  (available for 12 42 of countries)
• availability is fairly even across different
  levels of development.

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Some findings ICT infrastructure and access
7
Some findings ICT infrastructure and access
8
Availability of ICT indicators Access to, and
use of, ICT by households and individuals

• Access to, and use of, ICT by households and
  individuals (HH1HH13 and HHR1)
• these are mainly produced from household surveys
  run by statistical agencies
• most of the indicators are reasonably available
  for developed economies
• ..but not widely available for transition and
  developing economies
• the household ICT access indicators are more
  available for developing economies than the
  individual use indicators.

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Some findings Access to ICT by households
10
Some findings Access to ICT by households
11
Some findings Use of ICT by individuals
12
Availability of ICT indicators Use of ICT by
businesses

• Use of ICT by businesses (B1B12)
• these are mainly produced from business surveys
  run by statistical agencies
• availability is similar to household indicators,
  with all the indicators available for a majority
  of developed economies and..
• ..successively lower availability for transition,
  developing and least developed economies (for
  which none of the core indicators are available).

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Some findings Use of ICT by businesses
14
Some findings Use of ICT by businesses
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Availability of ICT indicators ICT sector

• The ICT sector (ICT1 and ICT2)
• statistics on the ICT sector are reasonably
  available for developed economies (about two
  thirds for each indicator) but less so for other
  economies
• some of those economies have statistics for ICT
  manufacturing industries but not services
• no data are available for the least developed
  economies.

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Some findings ICT sector
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Availability of ICT indicators trade in ICT
goods

• Trade in ICT goods (ICT3 and ICT4)
• statistics on ICT goods trade come from
  international goods trade statistics collected by
  customs organisations/statistical agencies and
  provided to the UNSD (UN COMTRADE)
• the trade core indicators are available for more
  than two thirds of countries overall
• availability is reasonably even across different
  levels of development.

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Some findings Trade in ICT goods
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Some findings Trade in ICT goods
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The future

• As the previous slides show, availability of data
  for many of the core ICT indicators could be
  improved.
• The Partnership is working towards this goal by
  providing technical assistance to countries
  statistical agencies and raising awareness among
  policy-makers about the importance of the core
  indicators
• and, particularly, the need for internationally
  comparable data for policy making purposes.
• Proposals to revise some of the core indicators
  are being presented at this meeting
• it is hoped that they will improve the
  availability and comparability of ICT data.

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Thank you

• Are there any questions?
• You can contact me on sheridanroberts_at_hotmail.com