Eurozone countries are in light blue

The Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment admitted on Monday that the issue of broadband penetration and take-up in Ireland is a serious issue. His reaction coincided with publication of data by the European Commission, which shows that in 2007, 74% of households in the Netherlands have broadband penetration compared with 31% in Ireland.

Minister Micheál Martin, the former schoolteacher, who is nominally responsible for ensuring that Ireland meets its goal of becoming a "world-class knowledge economy" in just over five years, also said that there has been dramatic progress on broadband rollout over the past two to three years and we are catching up with the European average.

Martin was reacting to a letter, sent by the Managing Director of eBay in Ireland, John McElligott, to politicians including Communications Minister Eamon Ryan and Martin.

In the letter, the head of the Irish operation of the web's top auction service, eBay, slammed Ireland's broadband infrastructure, describing it as being at developing world levels.

McElligott said we continue to fall farther behind other leading countries and that poor broadband connectivity is costing the economy lost opportunities and growth.

Martin said he is trying to secure a meeting with McElligott, and is anxious to discuss policies of this kind. He acknowledged that broadband penetration here is not good enough and that we should be better than the European average. But he said much of the current problems were due to failures by the private telecoms market to roll broadband out early on.

Internet access and e-skills in the EU27 in 2007: More than 40% of households have broadband internet access

In the EU27, 54% of households¹ had access to the internet during the first quarter of 2007, compared with 49% during the first quarter of 2006, and 42% had a broadband connection, compared with 30% in 2006.

This data comes from Eurostat, the Statistical Office of the European  Union.

The broadband data presents only a small part of the results of a survey from 2007 on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) usage in households and by individuals in the EU27 Member States, Norway and Iceland. As well as internet use and broadband connections the survey also covers e-shopping, e-government and e-skills.

Household internet access ranged from 19% in Bulgaria to 83% in the Netherlands

In 2007, the highest proportions of households with internet access were recorded in the Netherlands (83%), Sweden (79%) and Denmark (78%). The lowest levels were registered in Bulgaria (19%), Romania (22%) and Greece (25%).

The proportion of households with a broadband connection in 2007 was also highest in the Netherlands (74%), Denmark (70%) and Sweden (67%).

A quarter of individuals chat online, 15% make phone calls over the internet

In the first quarter of 2007 individuals in the EU Member states were asked which internet related activities they had already carried out in order to measure their e-skills. In the EU27, 57% of individuals had used internet search engines. Half of them had sent e-mails with attachments, while 30% said they kept viruses and spyware off their computers. Slightly more than one quarter had downloaded and installed software from the internet. Around one quarter of individuals had taken part in chatrooms, newsgroups or online discussions, and 15% had used the internet to make phone calls. Peer to peer file sharing for exchange of movies and music had been used by 13%. One tenth had created a web page.

The Member States most often reporting high proportions of individuals performing these different internet activities were Denmark, Estonia, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

Internet access by households, 2007 (%)

* EU27 excludes Malta.
: Data not available

Internet activities carried out, % of all individuals, 2007

* EU27 excludes Malta
: Data not available

1. The survey covered households containing at least one person aged 16-74, and individuals aged 16-74. The reference period was the first quarter of 2007. Households were asked about internet access by any member of the household at home. Individuals were asked about internet related activities they had ever carried out, at home or at any other location, in order to measure their skills.
2. Eurostat, Data in Focus 23/2007 "Internet usage in 2007 Households and individuals". The full set of data can be found on the Eurostat website and in the dedicated section: Science and Technology / Information society / Data.