Taiwan's broadband use lags behind South Korea

According to an Internet usage report released yesterday, Taiwan's high-speed Internet penetration rate lags far behind South Korea's -- the leader in Asian broadband use.

"In July 2001, 75 percent of South Korean households connected to the Web via broadband, while the number was only 18.4 percent in Taiwan," said Stephanie Chu (朱怡靜), research manager at NetValue Ltd Taiwan.

She added the penetration figure is lower than Hong Kong's 18.6 percent but higher than Singapore's 11.7 percent and China's 3.3 percent.

NetValue is a global Internet measurement company that aims to paint a picture of Internet usage and online consumer behavior.

Founded in France in 1998, the company has an Asian subsidiary with headquarters in Hong Kong.

According to Chu, South Korea's high broadband penetration rate can be attributed to the government's encouragement of online content development and its telecom competition rules.

"These two factors stimulate the need and usage of broadband Internet connection," Chu said.

The report showed that in South Korea the usage rates of online audio/video content and online games hit 79.3 percent and 57 percent respectively -- far ahead of other Asian countries.

The report also found that the favorite online activity for Taiwan's Internet users is sending and receiving e-mail, which does not require broadband but merely needs narrow band-width Internet connections via telephone lines.

Chu said that in general Koreans visit the Web for entertainment activities such as watching videos and playing online games, while users in Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong regard the Internet as a communication tool.

Other figures in the report revealed that in July Taiwan's Internet users hit 5.3 million Internet users, among which 18.4 percent or 970,000 people have adopted broadband use.

That number is different from the approximately 770,000 broadband users recorded by the Institute for Information Industry (資策會) in July.

The average broadband penetration in Taiwan has grown by 1 percent per month since last November, however from June to July it grew by 4.9 percent, the report said.