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could decide – before walking long hours into the market –
whether the daily price was worth the long walk.
Information plays an important role in business and economic
development as the source of knowledge, education and human
capital. The availability of better information helps to improve
education and health services, and provides knowledge, ideas
and opportunities. Thus it contributes to national productivity.
The efficiency of household activities increases with telecommu-
nications by enabling easy access to services like healthcare,
education and financial services.
But this easy access to telecommunications services should be
affordable to many ordinary people. Such affordability is a chal-
lenge in LDCs, one that must be tackled. Governments and
telecoms service providers have a duty to make access to ICT a
practical reality, not just a policy of universal access written in
government policies, statutory documents and companies’
annual reports. Universal access means that telecoms and ICT
services should be available and affordable to most people in
society at a reasonable distance from where these people live.
In the context of its numerous business activities with African
fixed and mobile operators, Belgacom International Carrier
Services responded positively to a request from the Social
Foundation of one of its African customers by donating 30
computers. These computers will be distributed to schools in
Senegal for the purpose of helping children to have access to the
many possibilities offered by ICT.
Telecommunications as a medium for transportation of
information
Telecommunication contributes to positive economic, social and
cultural development by facilitating the efficient transfer of infor-
mation. In the information age, the access to ICT through
telecoms is not simply a major factor in socioeconomic develop-
ment. Its absence could become an even greater constraint on
national development than in the past.
Malaysians, for example, use the Multimedia Super Corridor
(MSC) to develop the social lives of people and for the economic
development of their country through telemedicine, electronic
government, technological research and other kinds of develop-
ment. The primary means by which telecommunication services
can promote economic development is by serving as a medium
that facilitates the acquisition and transportation of information
in cost-effective ways while minimizing the obstacles of distance
and time. The Internet will make the world a global village by
interconnecting countries.
Through its quality SMS transit product, Belgacom International
Carrier Services has facilitated the exchange of international SMS
between African people in their home country and their relatives
in other countries. Such improved communication flow has defin-
itively strengthened again the link between dispersed relatives.
Direct and indirect effects of telecommunications on
economic development
Diffusion of new ideas and knowledge
– The importance of new
knowledge and new ideas as key elements for stimulating growth
is widely accepted. The source of knowledge and new ideas can
be domestic or global. If knowledge is local, telecommunications
technology can be used to globalize that local knowledge. This
process is known as localization: making a local idea global. Where
information or an idea is made known in various countries (and
usually adopted in those countries), this process is known as glob-
alization. ICT, then, makes both localization and globalization
possible. Modern telecommunications provide a cost-effective and
time-efficient medium for accessing the rapid development of ICT.
Reduction of the regional infrastructure and development gap
– The
telecommunications infrastructure gap existing today between
rural and urban areas gives rise to an information gap. This digital
divide threatens the economic power of rural areas. Increased
availability of telecommunication services can help to improve
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