Information access and issues of bandwidth

Abstract

There are two striking facts about African universities and bandwidth. The first is that the average university in Africa has the same aggregate bandwidth as a single home user in North America or Europe. The second is that the average African university pays 50 or 100 times more for this bandwidth than its counterparts in Europe or North America. Cross Atlantic fiber for research and education networks is now being obtained for $1 /mbps/month, while African institutions must pay over $5,000/mbps/month or more for the same bandwidth to connect to their counterparts in developed countries. © 2007 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.