# **1. Introduction**

Since its inception in the 1990s, the internet has transformed the ways people interact, businesses conduct commercial transactions, and governments deliver public services. Internet penetration—on both the supply side (infrastructure deployment) and demand side (user adoption)—continues to improve. International internet bandwidth nearly tripled between 2015 and 2019, to 466 terabytes per second.<sup>2</sup> The share of the global population using the internet increased from 8.0 percent in 2001 to 51.4 percent in 2018.<sup>3</sup> However, the penetration of fixed broadband internet is far from satisfactory in low-income countries, where, in 2018, fixed broadband subscriptions averaged 0.74 per 100 people.<sup>4</sup> In this context, mobile technologies show great potential to accelerate internet access and usage. Global mobile cellular subscriptions increased more than 10 times—from 0.74 billion in 2000 to 7.9 billion in 2018.<sup>5</sup> In low- and middle-income countries, mobile cellular subscriptions also reached a relatively high level of 102 per 100 people in 2018.<sup>6</sup> (However, it is worth noting that the unique mobile subscriber penetration rate, as a share of population, was still as low as 45 percent in the Sub-Saharan Africa region in 2018.<sup>7</sup> ) It is estimated that by 2020, 9 in 10 people will be covered by 3G networks that enable internet access from the palms of their hands (World Bank 2018). The increasing rate of mobile phone ownership in combination with expanding 3G network coverage promises to promote access to and usage of mobile internet.

Research findings have provided evidence on the development impacts of mobile internet access and usage. Katz and Callorda (2018) estimate that a 10 percent increase in mobile broadband penetration is associated with a 1.8 percent increase in gross domestic product (GDP) in middle-income countries, and a 2 percent increase in GDP in low-income countries. Mobile broadband coverage is also shown to have large and positive impacts on household consumption levels (Bahia et al. 2020). Mobile internet access and usage are also found to have a positive impact on people’s happiness and well-being (GSMA and Gallup 2018) and women’s empowerment (Bailur and Masiero 2017). It is argued that access to and usage of information and communication technology (ICT) reduce poverty, by fostering access to and exchange of information, and improving the transparency and accessibility of public services—all benefits that would also apply to mobile internet (Cecchini and Scott 2003; Roller and Waverman 2001; Waverman, Meschi, and Fuss 2005).

Despite the potential of mobile internet to help achieve development goals, there is a significant digital divide among and within countries. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the digital divide refers to the “gap between individuals, households, businesses and geographic areas at different socio-economic levels with regard to both their opportunities to access ICTs and to their use of the Internet for a wide variety of activities”. According to the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSMA 2019a), those who are not connected through mobile internet are disproportionately rural, women, or illiterate. For instance, in developing countries, women still remain 10 percent less likely than men to own a mobile phone, and 23 percent less likely than men to use mobile internet services. Similarly, rural populations are 40 percent less likely to use mobile internet than urban populations (GSMA 2019b).

> 2 TeleGeography. 3 ITU statistics. 4 World Development Indicators. 5 World Development Indicators.

> 6 World Development Indicators. 7 Statista.com.

2