EN Official Journal of the European Union CE 84/139

(2004/C 84 E/0178)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-4057/03

by Elspeth Attwooll (ELDR) to the Commission

(13 January 2004)

Subject: Trans-European telecommunications networks

What proportion of rural residents in the EU have broadband internet access, and how does this compare to that in urban areas? What is the projected impact in terms of economic growth of expanding broadband access in rural areas?

What role has the Trans-European telecommunications networks policy played in rolling out broadband internet access in rural areas? How might its role increase in the future, and does the Commission foresee the development and adoption of any other policy initiatives that aim specifically to improve the provision of broadband internet access in rural areas, particularly in the light of its work programme commitment to invest further in networks and knowledge? Does the Commission plan to make use of new technologies such as Galileo in this context?

Answer given by Mr Liikanen on behalf of the Commission

(17 February 2004)

At a time when broadband internet connections are experiencing very strong growth in the EU, the increase in the number of subscribers has mainly been in urban areas. While broadband access is available to more than 90 % of the population in urban areas in nearly all 15 Member States via Digital Subscriber Line (DSL), the EU average in rural areas is less than 50 %.

This situation is likely to change rapidly, however. In particular, the exchanges of good practice proposed at EU level (workshop on local and regional broadband initiatives held on 15 December 2003) have shown the growing commitment on the part of local public players to boost the deployment of electronic communications infrastructures in their territory, especially in areas which the market players would not normally enter. The Member States have moreover pledged to propose a national strategy for the development of high-speed by the end of 2003. The Commission will report to the Council and the European Parliament on these national strategies, including recommendations for their implementation in May 2004.

The Commission notes that broadband networks are increasingly considered a factor in the attractiveness of an area. For example, several studies carried out among small and medium-sized businesses show that, in some areas which are so far not served, more than 30 % of businesses plan to move out if no broadband internet access is provided within the next three years (study by the regional telecommunications observatory in France). Information and communications technologies are now regarded as a competitiveness factor which is likely to affect both the maintenance and development of business and employment as well as the capacity to create new services (eGovernment, eHealth, eLearning, eBusiness, etc).

The Growth Initiative for the deployment of trans-European networks adopted in December 2003 devotes one of its quick-start programmes to bridging the digital divide by providing broadband connections in remote and rural areas through the use of different technologies. The revision of the programming documents for the Community Structural Funds (CSF) this year should also boost public investment in the deployment of infrastructure by drawing in particular on the guidelines on the conditions and procedures governing the use of the Structural Funds in the electronic communications sector adopted by the Commission in July 2003 … The Structural Funds have earmarked over EUR 4,7 billion for the promotion of the information society, including telecommunications infrastructures, for less favoured regions (Objective 1) during the period 2000-2006. An extra EUR 1 billion has been made available for non-Objective 1 regions in the same field during the same period. Moreover, the European Regional Development Fund is co-funding regional programmes of innovative actions with over 70 regional governments focusing on the information society to explore new means for promoting the efficient use of information and communications technologies to boost regional development. In this way, for example, the Andalusian Guadalinfo programme is designed for peripheral rural towns with less than 20 000 inhabitants (1).

The total investment mobilised will be defined in the light of the commitments given by the Member States which have agreed to produce a national strategy for the development of high-speed, on the basis of which the Commission will present a report to the Telecom Council in June 2004. Furthermore, in May 2004 the Commission will be launching a Digital Divide Forum and inviting all players concerned to debate these issues of access and cohesion

All the information and provisions now appear in the Communication ‘Connecting Europe at High Speed: Recent developments in the electronic communications sector’, which the Commission adopted on 3 February 2004.

Although the Galileo satellite navigation and positioning system is not chiefly intended for telecommunications applications, it will bring a number of benefits to this sector, in particular by making broadband systems transmission more effective. In addition, Galileo receivers will provide a privileged platform for a series of future applications such as mobile telephones with positioning navigators and receivers (in vehicles, for example), with an emergency call system, for which the number to dial in Europe is 112.

(1) http://www.guadalinfo.net/