Section III: Why Addressing the Digital Divide Is Important
Economic Growth
30. Previous papers on e-commerce have indicated that if we are to grow our economy at an improved rate, New Zealand must have as many existing businesses as possible becoming proficient in e-commerce. It must also encourage entrepreneurship utilising e-commerce. In addition, the existing working age population (which makes up the large majority of our available workforce for the next 10 years10) must become proficient at using ICTs. This will enable us to grow the pool of skilled people able to work in the core and peripheral ICT industries and across the wide range of occupations and industries that increasingly are using ICTs.
31. The recent move by Ford to provide their workers with PCs, access to the Internet, and relevant training shows the importance of e-literacy in "old" industries. However, there is no indication that this action will be followed by other industry sectors, particularly the service and agriculture sectors where many low paid workers are employed, or by SMEs which account for 42 percent of all employees.
32. Without good access to ICT and being e-literate certain groups - low skilled or low paid workers, unemployed people, sole parents, and those with disabilities - are in danger of not being able to participate in the new forms of economic activity or the old ones that are increasingly being changed by ICT. Hence the actions of the American, British, Canadian and EU governments in supporting increased access to ICT and e-literacy. It is likely therefore that assisting people to improve their access to and skills with ICT will be an important means for the Government to grow an inclusive, innovative economy for the benefit of all New Zealanders.
33. The issue is not only one which affects adults. While children, being of the "born to IT" generation are more likely to adopt new technologies, their ability to do so is likely to be influenced by their parents' levels of income and education, and the decile of their school.11
34. Communities and locations with poor Internet availability are likely to be considered less favourable places for economic investments, thereby limiting enterprise development and job creation and restricting the growth of SMEs, currently seen as a key driver of economic growth.12 The Internet enables small businesses in less populated regions to aggregate viable customer bases by accessing the global customer base - 275 million people are estimated to be on the Internet currently.
35. Lack of access to the Internet is likely to be a particular constraint for the agriculture and horticulture sectors: rural New Zealand. New Zealand farmers and growers have been early adopters of new technology because the opening of markets has required adoption of best practice and increased efficiencies.13 However an Australian survey suggests that there may be a significant problem which militates against farmers using the Internet: the poor quality of the communications infrastructure which limits data transmission in many rural areas.14 This is already a problem in rural areas in New Zealand because of the tendency of many older electric fences to interfere with data sent over telephone lines. This in turn compromises the ability of farmers to undertake post-secondary study that another Australian report indicates is critical to improving agricultural competitiveness.1516
36. Lack of access in rural New Zealand is of particular concern given that the Australian research noted above identified the agriculture and horticulture sectors as standing to benefit greatly from a rapid adoption of e-commerce. Enhanced access to up to date information was seen as a potent device for improving profitability across the industry. The value of up to date information lies in the improved decision making it enables a producer to make about when, or whether, to take perishable or fragile products to uncertain markets. It also enables smaller or isolated producers to create markets virtually by using the Internet to aggregate potential buyers.
Social Cohesion
37. As use of ICTs becomes increasingly integrated into the normal processes of daily and business life, the negative impact of the digital divide on the cohesion of society is likely to become much more acute. With the advent of the Internet the bar for effective participation in society and the economy has risen. Not only do you have to have a telephone, radio and TV, and be able to read, think and write, you also have to have a computer, know how to type and navigate your way around Windows, and pay for access to the Net - particularly if you want to access information and maximise the large amount of knowledge the Internet makes so much more accessible. Moreover, while ICTs make the existence of other divides such as lack of literacy, low or no qualifications or geographical remoteness more acute, paradoxically they also offer increased opportunities to overcome them.
38. The Government has endorsed e-government, recognising the value of the Internet as a channel for improving service to citizens and making savings that can then be invested in value-added services to target clients. Ensuring that the widest range of people is able to participate in e-government will be important for achieving this as well as Government's goal of restoring trust in government and providing strong social services, particularly in rural areas.
39. The Internet also provides communities - geographical, cultural or self-defined - with enhanced opportunities for self-management: easier ways for members to communicate, share and obtain information, and improve social cohesiveness: all important for regional development. It encourages democratic participation in decision making: in essence requiring less from central government because more people can contribute to their individual and collective well being at a local level.
40. Research has identified that high social capital (networks, norms of reciprocity and trust) in rural communities makes them more effective in addressing internal problems and external constraints.17 The Internet is a powerful tool for rural dwellers to overcome many of the costs associated with networking and resource mobilisation - time, weather, transport difficulties and distance - and is an important network in its own right for accessing and sharing knowledge. The Internet also has the potential to help rural centres avert declines in population and even attract new residents by increasing access to higher education and business opportunities.
Advancing Other Key Government Goals
41. In addition, increasing access to ICT and e-literacy will also be crucial to the ability of the Government to advance other key goals including:
- Improving New Zealanders' skills
- Strengthening national Identity and upholding the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi
- Closing the Gaps for Maori and Pacific People in Health, Education, Employment and Housing.
Improving New Zealanders' Skills
42. Assisting New Zealanders to become e-literate will enable more New Zealanders to develop the skills to participate in the increasing range of jobs related directly to ICT (both technical and multi-media content), and to participate in e-commerce. Increasingly, traditional jobs are requiring higher levels of computer skills. The widespread provision of Internet based distance learning will enable students, in the compulsory and tertiary sectors as well as those in work, to more easily and cost-effectively access a wider range of subjects.
43. Our small and aging population, with its relatively low technical skills base compared to some industrialised countries, means that New Zealand needs as many people with the potential to work in the ICT industries to take up opportunities to do so. Increasing the number of e-literate people is a way of increasing the pool of people with the potential to develop technical skills for the information economy.
Closing the Gaps for Maori and Pacific People in Health, Education, Employment and Housing
44. As ICT skills are increasingly important for employability, and the number of transactions over the Internet increases, and more information and knowledge is held and distributed online, an important element of capability for Maori and for Pacific peoples will be their ability to use ICT, especially multi-media applications and the Internet. The Internet and associated software provide Maori and Pacific peoples with the ability to leapfrog in their economic and social development: a view held by the UN in relation to developing nations.
45. However, if a large proportion of Maori and Pacific peoples are those without access to ICT, they are likely to be restricted in their ability to develop capability in this regard: as will government in respect to closing the gaps. Notwithstanding this there is evidence that Maori are increasingly making good use of the Internet already for whanau, hapu, iwi, pan-tribal and urban Maori self-management and entrepreneurial activity.18
46. Maori (and Pacific Peoples) have a younger population than non-Maori: the median age of Maori was 21.6 years in 1996 compared with 33.0 years for the population generally. Children aged under 15 years make up 37 percent of the total Maori population compared to only 23 percent of the total New Zealand population. Young people, being in the "born to IT" generation, usually adapt more easily to ICT and use it entrepreneurially. If Maori are disproportionately excluded from access to ICT because of their ethnicity, economic circumstances, locations, attitudes or lack of skills, not only will Maori, individually and collectively, be severely disadvantaged but so will New Zealand as a whole. Maori will increasingly form a greater proportion of New Zealand's young working age population over the next fifty years.
Strengthening National Identity and Upholding the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi
47. As well as seeing ourselves on air, through television and radio, New Zealanders need to "see" ourselves on the Internet. Indeed increasing numbers of New Zealanders are creating cultural content for this medium because it is so inexpensive to do so. It is interesting to note in a recent quantitative study of Internet use that as Internet use increased viewing of television decreased.19 This suggests that over time an important feature of national identity will be the images, sounds and texts that individuals and groups create on the Internet - a self-publishing, highly democratic, participatory and inexpensive media compared to television.20
48. If the Internet is a potent vehicle for reflecting culture, then it is important that all elements of New Zealand society understand how to use it as a form of creative expression: to render themselves visible in this new media. This relates especially to Maori, recognising that there will be particular issues relating to protection of taonga and matauranga (knowledge) Maori for Maori to resolve.
Comment
49. Over time new forms of accessing the Net will decrease the complexity, cost and nature of how access is achieved. However, given the potential for the Internet to amplify existing social and economic disparities, policies to address these disparities need to be developed now in order for New Zealand to be able to maximise its human capital, advance more rapidly towards becoming a knowledge-based economy, and increase social cohesion.
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