High adoption rate of Information and Commu-nication Technologies is essential for a country wishing to progressively shape its socioeconomic activities and interactions. Pakistan can boast an exceptional cellular teledensity (68.6 percent as of May 2012) - yet the other half of the ICT deal cuts a sorry figure in the wake of limited internet usage and abysmal broadband penetration (just over two million subscriptions).
A recent report on Worldwide Web usage patterns ranks Pakistan 44 among 61 countries. The Web Index 2012 ranking - released by World Wide Web Foundation, a non-profit founded by Web inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee - is a multi-dimensional measure of the Webs utility and impact. It incorporates 85 indicators, including Web usage, content, infrastructure and Webs political, economic and social impacts.
"The Web has seen explosive growth since its invention in 1989. With more than a trillion estimated public pages and roughly 3.4 billion users, the Web is no longer merely a place to seek content and information, but to actively connect with others. However, more than 60 percent of the worlds population do not have access to the Web, and are therefore excluded from directly benefiting from it", the report highlighted.
With all its focus and investment in ICT, it is no surprise that Sweden topped the WI ranking. The United States ranked second, followed by the United Kingdom, Canada and Finland. The top five have scored consistently well on all indicators. The data indicates a strong correlation of high scores with GDP per capita, literacy rates and investment in community infrastructure.
Among the BRICS countries, just like the acronyms order, Brazil ranks above at 24 and South Africa in the end at 36. The bottom 10 countries are Nepal, Cameroon, Mali, Bangladesh, Namibia, Ethiopia, Benin, Burkina Faso, Zimbabwe and Yemen - and the authors attributed their poor performance to a vicious cycle of poor infrastructure and high costs of access.
Pakistan ranked below China (29) and India (33), on almost all the indicators. It ranked 11th in the Asia-Pacific region - with New Zealand, Australia and Singapore occupying the first three regional spots and India ranked at number eight.
Comparison of Pakistans Web scorecard with rest of the sample showcases that the country is faring no better than countries having worse socioeconomic profile than Pakistans. For the Institutional Infrastructure indicator, which assesses the institutional ecosystem including education, laws and regulations that enable Web access, Pakistan ranks amongst bottom 10, scoring below Tanzania and Nigeria.
Pakistan ranked in the vicinity of Kenya, Nepal and Ecuador on the Web Use indicator which measures the extent of internet usage in a country. Pakistan fared poorly not only vis-à-vis its neighbours but also scored below Ghana and Nigeria on the Social Impact indicator which evaluates the Webs impact on health, education and social activities.
The country ranked below Philippines, Egypt, Senegal and Ecuador on the Economic Impact indicator which appraises the Webs impact on business and economy. There is no single indicator that could dispel the gloom.
Pakistan is clearly lagging on the Webs coverage and content aspects. Investing in ICT infrastructure, developing the populations capability to really benefit from the cyber space, generating localised content and driving online migration in the public sector, may lead to betterment in such indicators. The concerned authorities must effectively employ entities of USF and the ICT/R&D Fund towards this end.