internet in belarus: some facts mikhail doroshevich

Internet in Belarus: Some Facts

Mikhail Doroshevichhttp://www.e-belarus.org


1. Penetration2. Infrastructure3. Cost main internet services4. Internet Users5. Domain .BY6. E-Government7. Content 8. Political parties9. NGO10. Conclusions


95%

37% 33,40%

0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

100%

Lithuania Belarus Ukraine

28,09%

16,24%

7,79%

0,00%

5,00%

10,00%

15,00%

20,00%

25,00%

30,00%

Lithuania Belarus Ukraine

mobile

internet


Infrastructure:

36 providers: 18 xDSL, 31 dial-up, 2 cable services


Cost main internet services:

Dial-up 20 hours per week 7.4 USD

Dial-up 30 hours per week 15 USD

Dial-up 40 hours per week 20 USD

Unmetered access 60 USD/mo

ADSL (500 MB traffic) 26 USD/mo

ADSL/IDSL (600 MB traffic) 50 USD/mo

ADSL (1 GB traffic) 100 USD/mo

Broadband (1 GB traffic) 50 USD/mo


Internet Users:

60% - Minsk, 20% - regional cities

422200

808700

14097801600000

2500000

0

500000

1000000

1500000

2000000

2500000

2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 est.

Domain .BY

Registrator: http://www.tld.byCost of registration, one time - 50 USD

Cost of technical support for one year - 50 USD.

Small zone: 3.500 records (For example: .ru – 368.000, .de – 6.000.000)No whois services.


http://www.tld.by/

E-Governmentonly 74 (8,2 percent) of 903 analyzed national, regional and district government bodies are represented online.

At the same time 73,2 percent of national government institutions (41 from 56), 11 percent of regional (8 from 72) and 3 percent of district (25 from 775) government bodies have their websites.

Among the 74 reviewed web-sites 41 (55,4percent) represent national, 8 (10 percent) – regional and 25 (33,8 percent) –district governing bodies.

22 percent of all websites are not updated.



General eGov Profile

0

0,1

0,2

0,3

0,4

0,5

0,6

e-informing

e-participation

e- services


Content:

Search Engines: TUT.BY, all.by

Rating systems: Akavita.BY, all.by

Catalogues: all.by, catalog.tut.by, akavita

News Portal: http://www.news.byhttp://www.tut.byhttp://www.naviny.byhttp://www.bdg.byhttp://www.svaboda.org

Communities: http://www.onliner.byhttp://forum.delta.by

http://www.news.by/

http://www.tut.by/

http://www.naviny.by/

http://www.bdg.by/

http://www.svaboda.org/

http://www.onliner.by/

http://forum.delta.by/


Polictical parties:

199 parliamentary candidates (49,8% of 400 registered by October 4, 2004) had their web-sites

or web-pages.

Politparty site Number of candidates presented

Web-Sites, specially to elections 55+ site 116Belarusian Parliament 61United Civil Party Web-site 8Lev Sapega Foundation branch 8Others 11


NGOs as well as political parties seem to lag behind the official structures in using the Internet: the NGOs are almost three times less likely to rely on the Internet.

The major reason behind this relatively limited Internet activities by the CSOs seems: besides the lack of resources, also a lower awareness of the Internet’s potential, and, perhaps as a result of it, endemic “online-practices illiteracy”, despite clear benefits that the Internet can offer

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

18-29 30-39 40-49 50-59 60+

%NGO members

%Internet users


Conclusions:

- Undeveloped infrastructure;

- Few websites with providing useful information;

- eGovernment - interactivity lacking;

- CSOs are not aware of Internet democratic potential.

Thank You!

internet in belarus: some facts mikhail doroshevich

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