On September 25th, 2015 the United Nations announced a set of 17 sustainable development goals for the world that would 'end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure prosperity for all'. One of those goals was to:

"Significantly increase access to information and communications technology and strive to provide universal and affordable access to the Internet in least developed countries by 2020."

In 2016 the Sub-Saharan nations averaged only 20% usage of the Internet, while the global average is 44%. By comparison more developed countries in 2016 had numbers upwards of 75%.

• United Kingdom 95%
• Japan 92%
• Canada 90%
• Germany 90%
• United States 76%

In a report from the United Nations, 34 African countries (nearly all sub-Saharan) face severe structural impediment to sustainable development. Only a third of sub-Saharan Africa has access to grid electricity. Beyond infrastructure problems, other barriers stand in the way.

• Lack of content in the diverse multitude of languages and dialects of Africa (which number in the thousands)
• Lack of skills to use the Internet and develop programs and content for local projects, i.e. "Digital Literacy"
• Data affordability

Access to the internet means access to systems that can better enable healthcare, education, and encourage economic development including facilitating small business transactions. Access will thus also assist with other sustainability goals such as poverty reduction and improved health. For example, the basic messaging service, mHero, helped connect health workers to coordinate relief efforts during the Ebola crisis. Mobile money services, such as M-Pesa by Safaricom in Kenya, have made personal and small business transactions more accessible through a simple text system that is available for basic-feature phones. The easier access to make and receive payments has been shown to have long-term effects on poverty reduction, gender equality, and employment opportunities.

Map by Alicea Zelesny, made as part of Interactive Cartography & Visualization Graduate Class (GEOG575) through the University of Wisconsin-Madison

March 5th, 2018

Back up to map

Data:

The data was pulled from The World Bank Open Data on February 11th, 2018. Details of the data, including meta data, can be found at data.worldbank.org. The information was collected from the International Telecommunication Union, World Telecommunication/ICT Development Report and database. Internet users are defined as individuals who have used the Internet (from any location) in the last 3 months. The Internet can be used via a computer, mobile phone, personal digital assistant, games machine, digital TV etc. and access can be fixed or via a mobile network.

South Sudan gained their independence in 2011 and had data reported from 2013 on. Due the constraints of this lab I chose not to include their information. Their numbers for those years are as follows:

• 2013 - 3.83%
• 2014 - 4.52%
• 2015 - 5.50%
• 2016 - 6.68%

The following countries had no data available in the listed years.

• Eritrea 2003-2006
• Liberia 2005-2006
• Sudan 2006, 2008-2009
• Rwanda 2006
• Seychelles 2009
• Somalia 2010

Sources:

Mourdouktas, Eleni. "Digital Revolution Holds Bright Promises." Africa Renewal: December 2017 - March 2018.http://www.un.org/africarenewal/magazine/december-2017-march-2018/digital-revolution-holds-bright-promises-africa

United Nations. Sustainable Development Goals. "Goal 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure." http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/infrastructure-industrialization/

'Utoikamanu, Fekitamoeloa Katoa and Brahima Sanou. "ICTs, LDCs, and the SDGs: Achieving Universal and affordable Internet in the least developed countries." http://unohrlls.org/news/24-january-2018-worlds-least-developed-countries-target-achieve-universal-affordable-internet-2020