By 
By Sonny Aragba-Akpore
Despite the rise in global internet connectivity,African countries still wobble on the outskirts of globalization. Paucity of investments,high costs of devices and political will may have been some of the reasons for the slow growth.
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The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) released its 2024 Facts and Figures in Geneva,Switzerland last week with Africa almost occupying the bottom line in connectivity. The ITU admits however that universal coverage is still elusive even though the growth in developed economies is high.
In 2024 ,5.5 billion people were online representing 68 per cent of the world population, compared with 65 per cent just a year earlier. The year-on-year growth rate is itself increased rom 2.7 just one year ago to 3.4 per cent this year. “But the same figure tells us that 2.6 billion people, one-third of the global population, are still offline but Universal connectivity remains a distant prospect.”
Internet coverage in high income vs low income countries
In high-income countries 93 per cent of the population uses the Internet. This contrasts starkly with the situation in low-income countries, where only 27 per cent of the population is online.
While the yearly growth rate in these economies averages 8.5 per cent in 2024, higher than in any of the other groups or regions, this is not sufficient to close the gap anytime soon.
The average monthly mobile broadband traffic per subscription in high-income countries 16.2 gigabytes (GB) is roughly eight times that in low-income countries with 2GB.
Put differently, an average user in a high-income country generates more traffic in just four days than a user in a low-income country does in a whole month. Though smaller than across income groups, regional disparities are still striking. The average monthly traffic in Africa is 3.1 GB per subscription, less than a quarter of the world average of 13.9 GB or one-sixth that seen in the Commonwealth Independent of States (CIS) with 19.1 GB.
Broadband affordability improves
The ITU Facts and Figures show that “in 2024 the two connectivity benchmarks, namely the data-only mobile broadband basket and the fixed broadband basket, have become more affordable in all regions of the world and for all income groups.
Globally the median price of the mobile broadband basket, expressed as a percentage of gross national income (GNI) per capita, dropped from 1.3 to 1.1 per cent, while that of the fixed broadband basket dropped from 2.8 to 2.5 per cent.”
“Nonetheless, lack of affordability continues to be a key barrier to Internet access, particularly in low-income economies. A wide gap persists between high-income economies and the rest of the world, despite small improvements.”
“Compared with the average mobile broadband subscriber in a high-income economy, subscribers in a lower-middle-income economy pay around six times as much of their income for such a basket, while subscribers in a low-income economy pay 19 times as much. A fixed broadband subscription, where one is available, costs the equivalent of nearly a third of the average person’s income in a low-income country.”
The United Nations Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development set an ambitious goal of making broadband in developing countries affordable by 2025. Affordability is defined as the availability of broadband access at a price that is less than two per cent of monthly GNI per capita.
140 economies currently meet the affordability target
“In the last two years, the availability of relevant price data has greatly improved. Out of the 208 economies for which data are available, 140 economies currently meet the affordability target for at least the data-only mobile broadband or the fixed broadband basket; this is nine more than in 2023.
“However, among the low-income and middle-income economies, only 65, around one-half, have met the Broadband Commission’s affordability target for at least one of the two baskets. Given recent trends in ICT prices and income levels, it is looking increasingly inevitable that most of the remaining population in these economies in that income group will miss the 2025 objective even for entry-level broadband access.”
Since commercial deployment of fifth generation (5G)began in 2019, its coverage has increased to reach 51 per cent of the world population in 2024 ITU figures for 2024 show. GSMA puts the figure at 54 % for its 2025 reports indicating a marginal growth of three percent.
Global 5G coverage still marginal
“However, the distribution is very uneven: 84 per cent of people in high-income countries are covered, but only four per cent in low-income countries. At the regional level, Europe boasts the highest 5G coverage, at 72 per cent of the population, followed by the Americas (63 per cent) and the Asia-Pacific region (62 per cent). Coverage is much lower in the Arab States (13 per cent), the CIS (12 per cent) and Africa (11 per cent).”
But Where 5G is not available yet, 4G remains a very good alternative, available to 92 per cent of the world population. In low-income countries, however, 4G only reaches about half the population (52 per cent), and 3G remains an important technology for connecting to the Internet.
In reality, urban areas are generally prioritized for infrastructure roll-out, being more densely populated and hence more profitable to network providers. This explains why globally 67 per cent of people living in urban areas have access to a 5G network, compared with only 29 per cent of those living in rural areas, a difference of almost 40 percentage points. The urban-rural gap affects all regions, ranging between 18 percentage points in the CIS region and 41 percentage points in the Asia-Pacific region.
In high-income countries, 90 per cent of the urban population has access to a 5G network, compared with only 58 percent of the rural population. In low-income countries, 5G is essentially unavailable in rural areas, and reaches only 10 percent of the urban population.
4G coverage more in urban and semi-urban areas
Mobile phones are the most common gateway to the Internet, so the prevalence of mobile ownership provides an indication of Internet penetration. “This is not a one-to-one relation, however: for one thing, people other than the owner may use the phone to access the Internet like children using the phone of a parent and some mobile phones are used on a calls-only basis (feature phones, limited subscriptions)”.
Furthermore, some people may own more than one mobile phone like in Nigeria. In most countries, the percentage of individuals owning a mobile phone is somewhat higher than the percentage of individuals using the Internet.
The Global System of Mobile Communication Association (GSMA) released its yearly report last week too saying that the Fourth-generation (4G) technology has emerged as the most dominant network across the globe, with about 7.6 billion people now enjoying the service. In its State of Mobile Internet Connectivity report, it also disclosed that 5G now covers more than half of the world’s population accounting for 54%.
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) data show that 4G network has reached 50.8 per cent of the population, followed by 2G, which covers 38.6 per cent; 3G, 7.38 per cent and 5G, 3.17 per cent in the country. Three key players are MTN,Airtel and GloMobile. But the coverage is more in urban and semi urban areas where 4G is predominantly concentrated and pockets of 5G.
“Almost 7.6 billion people worldwide now have 4G coverage, equivalent to 93 per cent of the global population. The majority of network investment continues to be in 5G deployments. 5G coverage has now reached more than half the world’s population (54 per cent or 4.4 billion people) with more than 700 million additional people covered in 2024.”GSMA submitted.
Internet access vs device affordability
On Nigeria ,GSMA said, 78 per cent of rural respondents interviewed during its in-country survey, are aware of mobile Internet but only 39 per cent own an Internet-enabled phone a drop-off of 39 percentage points. This drop-off is also significant for urban respondents but smaller, at 24 percentage points.
While there are reports of fast growth of internet around the globe, 5G in Nigeria is still in its early days, mainly serving urban areas and those users familiar with the technology, desirous of fast speed connectivity and can afford high end devices and data plans.
“However, as infrastructure improves and device costs drop, 5G could become the foundation for Nigeria’s digital transformation” according to an analyst.
For those who live in major cities and have 5G-capable devices, and can afford higher data costs, 5G is a win win technology but consumes data faster than any other technology.
