broadband strategies handbook.pdf - Khazar University

individuals generally have a better chance of finding employment as well ashigher earning potential (UNCTAD 2009, 57). Bridging the connectivitydivide is critical to ensuring that today’s students—and tomorrow’s hightechworkforce—can take advantage of these benefits.One way to expand access to broadband and ICTs in rural and remoteareas is through the deployment of mobile education labs. These labs, whichmay simply be vehicles fitted with broadband connectivity, computer equipment,and learning facilities, allow educators to drive to various schoolsthroughout the week (Samudhram 2010). In addition, mobile educationlabs can provide ICT training for adults to improve digital literacy. Asopposed to transporting children in rural areas to where broadband facilitiesexist or waiting until the network is built out to them, mobile facilitiesoffer a cost-effective way to reach rural populations. The United Nations hasnoted the success of mobile schools in Mongolia, where 100 mobile “tent”schools have been introduced in 21 provinces, as well as in Bolivia (UnitedNations 2010). Bolivia has implemented a bilingual education program forthree of the most widely used indigenous languages, which has beenexpanded to include indigenous children in remote areas. In Morocco, thegovernment implemented a program called NAFID@ to help over 100,000teachers to afford wireline or mobile broadband connections, which hasallowed teachers to receive training in the use of ICTs in the classroom aswell as to use e-learning programs and online libraries to improve class lessons(Intel 2010).Health Care Sector: Improving Health and Medical OutcomesHealth-based broadband applications and services are significantly improvinghealth and medical outcomes around the world, particularly for patientsin remote areas and those with limited mobility, through e-health andm-health initiatives (WHO 2005). Considering that there are fewer than 27million doctors and nurses for the more than 6 billion people in the world—and only 1.2 million doctors and nurses in the lowest-income countries—harnessing mobile technologies is a valuable tool for enabling health carepractitioners to reach patients. As mobile broadband develops and spreadsin developing countries, the benefits are already becoming clear (box 1.3).Although basic voice and data connections can be useful in improvinghealth and medical care, broadband connectivity is necessary to capture thefull potential of e-health services, including telemedicine, which enablesreal-time audio and video communications between patients and doctors aswell as between health care providers. Improvements in telemedicine andother e-health initiatives rely on increasing bandwidth capacity, more storageand processing capabilities, and higher levels of security to protect16 Broadband Strategies Handbook