Bridging the digital divide in Sri Lanka: The 'mobile' way

by Chanuka Wattegama

A recent phenomenon seen in many circles is the sudden interest of taking Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to the villages. Rarely a day passes without a newspaper reporting a related event in some corner of the country.

There was a time most of the outstation schools did not even have the basic science laboratory facilities. On the other hand, a Computer laboratory today is not a distant dream even for the schools in the remotest and the least privileged areas. We often see ICTs portrayed as means capable of bringing the much needed socio-economic solutions to the rural communities in Sri Lanka.

This is indeed a good sign. This clearly shows that we recognise not only the importance of the issue of 'Digital Divide' between the rural and urban areas of the country (and also perhaps between the urban elite and the urban poor) but also the need to bridge it, as soon as possible. The days of few questioning the point of giving computers to the schools with even no electricity facilities and adequate furniture have long passed.

However, when talking about bridging the 'Digital Divide' most of us - not excluding myself-are significantly biased towards the 'I' in ICTs. We talk about taking PCs to villages, building tele-centres for villagers etc. Not that I suggest anything wrong in taking about the 'information' part. Still information per se has no value in bridging the Digital Divide if the 'C' or the communication aspect in ICTs is not given its due position.

So this is an attempt to recognise the value of the missing 'C', or rather 'M' - the mobile part of the communication, in bridging the urban rural disparities in information access.

There is no question that the information revolution has begun even among the rural communities, but a real impact of computers in improving the socio-economic conditions of the rural poor is yet to be seen.

As the recent computer literacy survey conducted by the Census and Statistics Department, on average basis, only four out of one hundred households in Sri Lanka posses a computer. There is also a significant unequal availability of computers in households. While 10 per cent of urban households possess a computer, only 3 per cent of rural households do so.

It is even lower, just 0.3 per cent in estate households. Further, the availability of computers in households is highest in the Western province (8 per cent) and this is followed by the Central and North Western provinces (3 per cent). Uva province reported the lowest percentage of 0.4 per cent. This clearly indicates that we still have a long way to go in making the dream of Bill Gates in making each household having at least one PC.

On the other hand, in the communication front-that too in the mobile front - we have done quite well as a country. Please note that both PCs and mobile phones were introduced to Sri Lanka roughly at the same time, or strictly speaking mobile phones come one or two years later.

Still, we only have about 500,000 usable PCs and not more than 150,000 Internet connections. On the other hand, there are at least 1.5 million mobile connections in Sri Lanka. I take these from the published sources, so they might be slightly outdated. It was a few months ago, that the mobile operator with the largest market share celebrated having its one millionth customer, so the aggregate number of cellular connections at present cannot be too far from the 2 million mark, or one mobile phone for every ten people.

As they are 'mobile', it does not make much sense in linking a mobile phone to a geographical area. However, the traffic and the coverage by the four different mobile phone operators clearly show that mobile phones are distributed all over the island. They might be still largely concentrated to the pockets in the urban areas, but the distributions are relatively healthier than that of the PCs and Internet connections.

A recent Internet traffic survey by a major telecom services provider reveals that 89 per cent of the Internet traffic is from exchanges in Colombo and Kandy central regions while the rest of the country accounts only for 11 per cent. In case of mobile phones, the condition is at least not as bad as this.

The Computer literacy survey also defined 'It literacy' only as a user's ability to operate a PC. The Census and Statistics Dept. could have gone one step ahead and asked the people whether they could use a mobile phone or send an SMS. Since this was not done, we still do not know exactly how far the Sri Lankan population is competent in using the mobile phones.

As for computer literacy, it was found that at national level, 10 per cent of the population is computer literate.

Western Province reported the highest computer literacy rate of 15 per cent and the lowest percentage of 5 per cent was reported from Uva and North Central provinces. At the district level, the highest computer literacy rate of 20 per cent was reported from the Colombo district. Over 10 per cent literacy rates were reported from Gampaha, Kalutara, Kandy and Matara districts. The Monaragala district reported the lowest computer literacy rate of 3 per cent.

Needless to say, that the mobile phone usage throughout the country is much better than this. It is no more a business communication tool, used by the selected few in the business community. If anyone bothered to conduct a survey, it would have surely revealed that the business usage is only a small fraction of the total.

In terms of the impact, while the rural communities still find PCs 'out of place', mobile phones have succeeded in a big way. Thanks to mobile phones thousands of farmers and fishermen in this country get the correct price information. Thanks to mobile phones people like three-wheeler drivers, plumbers, masons, carpenters, vegetable sellers etc. find more business.

Earlier they had to put an effort to find business everyday, but now with the help of their mobile phones they get news about new jobs to their places. So unlike a PC, mobile phone has already become an integral part of life - even at the village level.

The impact mobile phones have made in the islandwide vegetable and fruit prices is remarkable. Once I did an informal study on this. Coming from Polonnaruwa to Colombo, I checked the prices at few selected vegetables from the roadside boutiques.

Then I compared the same with the published market prices of the same products at the Manning market. Though this can be hardly called a complete research, the results I have got are surprisingly indicative.

The prices of most of the vegetables and fruits (especially mangoes) increased proportionately along the way from Polonnaruwa to Colombo. Also even in areas near Polonnaruwa, the prices are not as low as one would think. The relatively minor price differences clearly indicated the transport costs. If the transport costs were not considered, the prices are almost the same everywhere.

What was the reason for these striking similarities in prices? Everybody in the value chain, starting from the farmer at one end and the retail marketers at the other end, is now constantly conscious about the price variations. They keep themselves updated using the latest mobile technology.

This successfully addresses the information symmetry in the market and the farmers no more have to be at the mercy of the middlemen who exploit them. In some cases they can even decide exactly when to harvest, depending upon the price variations.

Although no systematic studies have been done on the impact of the mobile communications in improving the healthcare facilities, there is no doubt it has a visible positive impact on reduction of the number of casualties due to accidents and suicidal attempts.

As seen by recent examples, in disastrous situations, whether it is floods or tidal waves, which sweep the coastal areas, what the mobiles can do, can never be underestimated. Particularly, even when the terrestrial networks fail to operate due to bad weather conditions the mobile networks still work ensuring the indispensable communications.

Another interesting factor is the fierce competition mobile connections give to the fixed lines. Even after more than a century of operation, the number of fixed lines has still not reached the one million mark.

According to the Central Bank of Sri Lanka Annual Report for the year 2003, the fixed lines have increased by 6 per cent in the metropolitan area and 7 per cent in other areas. Meanwhile the number of applicants in the waiting lists have increased by 19 per cent and 24 per cent in 2002 and 2003 respectively. So even with the assumption that the supply could meet the demand, (which is obviously not the case here) the growth of fixed lines could have increased only by about 30 per cent.

Now take the growth figures of the mobile phones. According to the same report, the mobile connections have increased 40 per cent in the year 2002 and 50 per cent in the year 2003.

The Annual Report also identifies the improvements in the cellular telephone technology, aggressive competition, affordable initial costs, quick supply and expansion of coverage as the main reasons for the significant growth in this sector. In a nutshell, this can be summarised as the growing perception of the affordability and the user-friendliness of the mobile phones and recognition of it as an indispensable tool in their daily lives, by a large percentage of the population.

This mobile revolution is not something unique to Sri Lanka. Worldwide the mobile phone usage has doubled since the year 2000. The number of mobile phones used today is estimated to be in the range of 1.5 billion while the number of PCs is in the range of 500 million. (Interestingly, in case of both these products Sri Lanka consumes about one-thousandth part of the total).

This indicated still enough room for development, considering Sri Lankan population to world population is in the range of 3 to 1,000. Somalia is an extreme example for a country where mobile networks still thrive even without a formal government for the past ten years.

The country still has no Parliament, no tax authority or no telecom regulatory authority but that has not prevented three mobile operators to start providing mobile connections. Somalia, a nation with a population of seven million now boast 25,000 mobile connections, and they seem to be both more economical and easier to obtain, that attempting the same in neighbouring Kenya, because the market seems to be hundred per cent open.

In terms of information dissemination still we cannot be complacent about what is being achieved with the mobile communications, but with the advent of the new technologies, the situation might not remain the same.

With the mobile internet and wireless broadband the future prospects are enormous and endless. So it is quite possible that the PC might never beat the mobile phone, even in future in successfully bridging the Digital Divide.

(chanuka@hotmail.com)