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OECD: U.S. Lags in Broadband Rollout

Posted on: Wednesday, 12 April 2006, 18:00 CDT

PARIS - The United States still trails South Korea, Canada and much of northern Europe in rolling out high-speed Internet access, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

An OECD survey published this week counted 16.8 broadband subscriptions per 100 people in the United States in December, putting it in 12th place among the 30 industrialized member states of the Paris-based organization - up one notch from a year earlier.

In an editorial published April 3 by the Financial Times newspaper, U.S. Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin wrote the United States was "closing in on President George W. Bush's goal of providing broadband access to every U.S. household."

The United States ranked fourth in 2001, when only South Korea, Canada and Sweden had larger ratios of broadband subscribers. Since then, Iceland, the Netherlands, Denmark, Switzerland, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Belgium and Japan have jumped ahead.

First-placed Iceland claims 26.7 subscriptions per 100 inhabitants, according to the OECD survey, which was based on government data as well as telecommunications operators' published figures.

No. 11 Japan has been relatively slow to adopt broadband, but leads the field in ultra-fast fiber optic Internet services, the study found. Japan took advantage of its high population density to invest in the next-generation infrastructure and leapfrog the slower DSL and cable technologies.

In Korea, fiber-based connections grew 52.4 percent in 2005, the OECD said.

DSL remains the most access technology in 28 of the 30 countries, claiming an overall market share of 62 percent. Cable accounts for 31 percent of broadband subscriptions, and other platforms - including satellite, fiber and fixed wireless - for 7 percent.

Source: Associated Press/AP Online

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