News18 : Feb 27, 2019, 11:13 AM
India has been ranked 47th in the overall "Inclusive Internet Index 2019" score while Sweden topped chart, followed by Singapore & US, a Facebook-led study has revealed. Internet Index prepared by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) for Facebook, there are demonstrable benefits from comprehensive female e-inclusion policies, digital skills programmes. Fixed-line Internet access is too expensive or inaccessble."However, affordability is declining relative to monthly income in many countries, disproportionately affecting women and people in low income countries, all of whom are more reliant on mobile as their primary means of accessing the Internet," Pepper mentioned. While the percentage of households connected to the Internet globally increased, on average from 53.1 per cent to 54.8 per cent, the rate of growth in Internet connections slowed to 2.9 per cent in 2019 from 7.7 per cent in 2018."In some countries, fixed-line Internet access is too expensive or inaccessible, that's why mobile services are critical."While lower middle income countries had a significant 66 per cent improvement in 4G coverage, low income countries saw a moderate 22 per cent improvement," informed the report. The Index this year was expanded to include 100 countries, representing 94 per cent of the world's population and 96 per cent of global GDP.