Finance parliamentary secretary Jason Azzopardi yesterday told the opening of the EGPA conference on the informatics era that Malta planned to be one of the 10 best countries in the world in information technology.

EGPA stands for European Group for Public Administration. Dr Azzopardi said Malta has embraced technology, in that it recognises the vital role it plays in the economic development of the country.

“The mobile penetration rate now stands at 94 per cent. Out of every 100 persons in the population, 25 per cent have an internet subscription. This places Malta in the 11th place in Europe, up five places since last year. There also is virtually complete DSL and cable modem networks coverage, while mobile connectivity methods are not yet fully exploited. While the number of active narrowband subscriptions decreased by 61.0 per cent between January to March 2009 over the corresponding quarter last year, the number of broadband users increased by 14.0 per cent when compared to the first quarter of 2008,” he said.

The European Commission’s Digital Competitiveness report which was published recently shows that Europe’s digital sector has made strong progress since 2005 - 56 per cent of Europeans now regularly use the internet, 80 per cent of them via a high-speed connection (compared to only one third in 2004), making Europe the world leader in broadband internet.

People aged between 16 to 24 years are the most active internet users. Internet use is destined to increase as this age cohort enters the labour market. Pro-active policy making across Europe must ensure that everyone has access to a high-speed internet connection and that there is an online single market, where people can easily use online services across borders.