SA broadband: still crawling the Internet
While most South African Internet users have to contend with maximum broadband speeds of between 1 and 4Mbps, the average Japanese user is enjoying download speeds of more than 63Mbps. This is according to a new study by the US-based Information Technology and Innovation Fund, a research think tank.
The report, Explaining International Broadband Leadership, was released on May 1 and ranks members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development(OECD) on cost, penetration and speed of their broadband services.
Top of the list was South Korea which, while only having average download speeds of around 50Mbps, has a penetration rate of 0.93 subscribers per household. Japan follows with a penetration rate of 0.55 subscribers per household but average download speeds of around 63.6Mbps. Finland with average speeds of 21.7Mbps claimed third spot on the list of 30.
When ranked by cost, Japan's cheapest cost per megabit/s was around $0.13 (almost R1), France's at at $0.33 and South Korea at $0.37.
In South Africa a Telkom 384kbps ADSL line costs R152 a month to rent. A 4Mbps line costs R413 a month.
Further down the list of OECD countries in the United States at 15 with download speeds of 4.9Mbps at $2.83 megabit/s and the United Kingdom paying $1.24 per megabit for average speeds of 2.6Mbps.
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