Message-ID: <19990714020903.AAA29431@LOCALNAME> Date: Tue, 13 Jul 1999 23:11:02 +0000 From: Kerry Miller <mailto:kerryo@ns.sympatico.ca> Subject: Fin. Times: UNDP calls for info-tax for development To: mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU
********* Copyright 1999 The Financial Times Limited *****************
Financial Times (London)
July 12, 1999, Monday
The UNDP wants a tax imposed on information sent through the
internet to help developing countries, writes Andrew Balls:
It costs $75 and takes five days to send a 40-page document from
Madagascar to Cote d'Ivoire. It costs $45 and takes half an hour to
fax it. It costs around 20 cents and takes two minutes to send it by
e-mail, which can go to thousands of people at no extra cost. "The
choice is easy, if the choice is there," says the 1999 United
Nations Human Development Report.
...
"Communications technology sets this era of globalisation apart
from any other. The internet, mobile phones and satellite networks
have shrunk space and time," the report says.
...
The report highlights information technology's potential in the fields
of health and education, as well as business.
The typical US medical school library subscribes to 5,000 or more
journals. Nairobi University's medical school - regarded as a
leading centre in east Africa - subscribes to just 20 journals.
The internet makes it possible to get information, such as medical
journals, to developing countries at far lower cost. However,
medical schools, universities, schools and governments that have
least access to more traditional sources of information - not
surprisingly - also tend to be poorly connected.
As well as driving globalisation, the information revolution carries
the risk of polarisation, the report says. "The network society is
creating parallel communication systems: one for those with
income and education; the other for those without connections,
blocked by high barriers of time, cost and uncertainty and
dependent on outdated information."
...
It calls for a tax on information sent through the internet, with the
proceeds used to help provide expensive equipment in poor
countries. With rapid growth of the internet, a very small tax could
still raise sums far in excess of the world's rich countries' official
aid budgets.
But this will be of little help where developing countries do not have
functioning education systems. For example, in Benin, 60 per cent
of the population is illiterate. "Even for the newest and most
advanced technologies, the most basic and long-standing policy
lies at the heart of the solution," the report concludes.
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