Weak Business Infrastructure Hits Egypt’s Ranking

Egypt’s consumer infrastructure is the country’s highlight in the 2009 Connectivity Scorecard.  PSTN minutes are high as is the use of mobile services which are backed up with good mobile coverage for the population.

However, internet usage is rather low and broadband penetration is quite weak.  This trend carries over into business connectivity, where bandwidth availability, business spending on IT resources and the penetration of secure servers all fail to match the top performers in the sample.  The only positive business usage indicator is secondary school enrolment – all other areas provide below average scores.  Egypt’s E-Government ranking is above the median, but still modest.

Egypt’s telecommunications sector has not benefited from the same type of deregulation as other nations surveyed.  While the mobile sector is healthy, the fixed-line bandwidth and services necessary for a robust business infrastructure have not materialized, indicating an area where improvements are necessary.

Egypt Connectivity Performance by Scorecard Component