Households without internet access for financial reasons (i08)
- 29/11/2024
- objective
- assessment
In 2023, there were 1,2% households without Internet access at home due to high costs of access or equipment in Belgium. To achieve the sustainable development goal by 2030, this figure must be reduced to 0%. This objective will not be reached by continuing the trend since 2008 (data available in November 2024). The percentage of households without Internet access at home due to high costs of access or equipment is therefore developing unfavourably.
Households without internet access for financial reasons - Belgium - trend assessment
percentage
| 2000 | 2008 | 2010 | 2015 | 2020 | 2023 | 2025 | 2030 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| observations | -- | 12.3 | 9.9 | 6.2 | 2.3 | 1.2 | -- | -- |
| trend and extrapolation (November 2024) | -- | 12.7 | 9.9 | 5.3 | 2.4 | 1.4 | 1.1 | 0.6 |
| objective 2030 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
Statbel (2023), Survey on the use of ICT in households and by individuals, https://statbel.fgov.be/ (consulted on 20/03/2024); calculations FPB.
Households without internet access for financial reasons - Belgium and international comparison
percentage
| 2008 | 2010 | 2011 | 2015 | 2019 | 2020 | 2022 | 2023 | 2023//2008 | 2023//2019 | 2019//2011 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Belgium | 12.3 | 9.9 | 8.3 | 6.2 | 3.1 | 2.3 | 1.7 | 1.2 | -14.4 | -21.0 | -11.6 |
| EU27 | -- | -- | 9.0 | 6.1 | 3.2 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -12.1 |
| //: Average Growth Rates | |||||||||||
Statbel (2023), Survey on the use of ICT in households and by individuals, https://statbel.fgov.be/ (consulted on 20/03/2024) and Eurostat (2024), Households - reasons for not having internet access at home [isoc_pibi_rni], https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat (consulted on 31/10/2024).
Households without internet access for financial reasons, by household type - Belgium
percentage
| 2008 | 2010 | 2015 | 2019 | 2020 | 2022 | 2023 | 2023//2008 | 2023//2019 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| single person | 20.0 | 17.6 | 12.1 | 7.1 | 5.2 | 3.4 | 2.6 | -12.6 | -22.0 |
| single-parent family | 23.4 | 17.9 | 9.7 | 2.2 | 2.2 | 1.3 | 0.5 | -22.3 | -29.7 |
| 2 adults | 10.1 | 7.9 | 4.8 | 2.3 | 1.3 | 1.1 | 0.6 | -17.5 | -29.8 |
| 2 adults, child(ren) | 7.7 | 5.8 | 1.7 | 0.4 | 0.4 | 0.5 | 0.4 | -18.5 | -3.2 |
| 3+ adults | 4.8 | 3.1 | 2.0 | 0.0 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.6 | -13.2 | -- |
| 3+ adults, child(ren) | 7.2 | 2.9 | 2.8 | 0.4 | 0.7 | 0.5 | 0.0 | -- | -- |
| //: Average Growth Rates | |||||||||
Statbel (2023), Survey on the use of ICT in households and by individuals, https://statbel.fgov.be/ (consulted on 20/03/2024).
Households without internet access for financial reasons, by location - Belgium
percentage
| 2008 | 2010 | 2015 | 2019 | 2020 | 2022 | 2023 | 2023//2008 | 2023//2019 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| cities | 13.8 | 11.5 | 8.1 | 4.3 | 2.9 | 1.4 | 1.0 | -15.9 | -30.1 |
| towns and suburbs | 10.1 | 7.0 | 5.5 | 2.3 | 1.7 | 1.5 | 0.9 | -14.8 | -20.8 |
| rural areas | 14.7 | 13.9 | 5.0 | 2.9 | 3.0 | 3.1 | 2.6 | -10.9 | -3.0 |
| //: Average Growth Rates | |||||||||
Statbel (2023), Survey on the use of ICT in households and by individuals, https://statbel.fgov.be/ (consulted on 20/03/2024).
Households without internet access for financial reasons, by income - Belgium
percentage
| 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2023//2021 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| quintile 1 | 6.2 | 3.9 | 3.0 | -30.6 |
| quintile 2 | 3.2 | 2.2 | 1.6 | -29.2 |
| quintile 3 | 1.6 | 1.6 | 1.3 | -9.4 |
| quintile 4 | 0.3 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 23.7 |
| quintile 5 | 0.4 | 0.4 | 0.1 | -63.7 |
| //: Average Growth Rates | ||||
Statbel (2023), Survey on the use of ICT in households and by individuals, https://statbel.fgov.be/ (consulted on 20/03/2024).
Definition: the percentage of households without internet access at home because the cost of access or equipment is too high.
The data comes from the Survey on the use of ICT (information and communication technologies) and internet in households and by individuals. Statbel organises this EU-harmonised survey in Belgium and makes the results available, in particular to Eurostat. The data used here for Belgium comes directly from Statbel, while the data used for comparison with the rest of the EU comes from Eurostat. Since these data are based on surveys, a margin of uncertainty should be taken into account. The confidence intervals for these data are available on request from Statbel.
Goal: the percentage of households without Internet access at home due to high costs of access or equipment must be brought to 0%.
The Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs adopted by the UN in 2015 include target 1.4: "By 2030, ensure that all men and women, in particular the poor and the vulnerable, have equal rights to economic resources, as well as access to basic services, ownership and control over land and other forms of property, inheritance, natural resources, appropriate new technology and financial services, including microfinance".
In the European Declaration on Digital Rights and Principles for the Digital Decade, the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission commit to "ensuring access to high-quality connectivity, with available Internet access, for everyone wherever in the EU, including for those with low income" (European Parliament, Council, Commission, 2023).
These two frameworks converge towards the same goal: to eliminate financial barriers to Internet access and achieve a rate of 0% of households without a connection at home for cost reasons by 2030.
International comparison: the percentage of households without internet access at home due to high costs of access or equipment is lower in Belgium than in the EU27 throughout the period considered (2011-2019). In 2019, the percentage of households in the EU27 without internet access at home because the cost of access or equipment is too high was 3.2%, just 0.1 percentage point higher than in Belgium.
Moreover, the decrease in the percentage of households without internet access for financial reasons observed in Belgium between 2011 and 2019 also holds for the EU27. Over this period, the percentage of households without internet access at home because the cost of access or equipment is too high fell from 9.0% to 3.2% in the EU27 (from in 8,3 to 3,1 % in Belgium).
When Member States are divided into three groups, Belgium is part of the group with average performance and outperforms the European average in 2019. In that year, the Netherlands ranked first with 0.45% and Portugal last with 10.48%.
UN indicator: the selected indicator does not correspond to any monitoring indicator for the SDGs, but is linked to UN target 1.4. because internet access can be considered as a basic service in the European Union.
Sources
-
General
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SDGs, Sustainable Development Goals: United Nations (2015), Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Resolution adopted by the General Assembly on 25 September 2015, document A/RES/70/1.
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Indicators: United Nations (2017), Work of the Statistical Commission pertaining to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Resolution adopted by the General Assembly on 6 July 2017, document A/RES/71/313.
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UN Sustainable Development: https://sdgs.un.org/ (consulted on 18/01/2023).
- UN Sustainable Development Goal indicators website: https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/ (consulted on 18/01/2023).
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Specific
- European Parliament, Council and Commission (2023), European Declaration on Digital Rights and Principles for the Digital Decade, https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32023C0123(01) (consulté le 24/09/2024).
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