Public digital infrastructure must bridge every digital divide

livemint.com:

Among the concerns often raised in connection with the proliferation of digital public infrastructure (DPI) is the worry that nations that are reliant on digital systems for the delivery of public services will end up excluding those incapable of accessing these digital solutions from the benefits these systems were built to offer. As digitization efforts accelerate across the globe, the schism between those who can access these systems and those who cannot is only going to get more acute. Most people associate digital capacity with connectivity.

As much progress as we have made so far towards connecting people across the planet, there are vast spaces left to cover. Very few countries, even among the most developed, can claim to have so completely blanketed their territory with network coverage as to be able to offer 100% connectivity to their citizens. What this means is that, even today, large segments of the world’s population still lack access to our digital systems.

As public administration becomes increasingly digital everywhere, this will eventually become the single biggest obstacle to the widespread availability of public services. The obvious solution would be to extend our connectivity infrastructure to the farthest corners of the globe. This will require tremendous investment in fibre-optic cables, satellite transponders, cellphone towers and all the other paraphernalia needed to build the physical infrastructure of digital connectivity.