Reach every home: building universal digital services
By Adam Branson on 18/01/2021
A digital infrastructure for everyone: affordability and public confidence are as crucial to online service delivery as network coverage. Credit: Forestinteractive/Wikimedia.
Governments need strong digital infrastructure to provide citizens with online services and boost economic growth. At a GGF webinar, the panel considered how to develop national communications networks – and how to get people using them. Adam Branson reports
During 2020, governments around the world responded to the coronavirus by rapidly moving services online – making them available to citizens even during lockdowns, while protecting both staff and users from the risk of infection. But availability doesn’t guarantee accessibility: to ensure that everyone can use online public services, governments must extend digital networks into every home. And as the pandemic pushes ever broader swathes of activity online – from