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Digital Divide in Japan

The digital divide in Japan refers to the disparity of access to the Internet by the population of Japan. Multiple factors influence this divide. Cultural aspects of Japanese people contribute to the digital divide in the nation. Contributing cultural factors to the digital divide present in Japan are closing over time. Groups shown to be improving access include women and the elderly.97.1% of the households in Japan have internet access at home while 81% of the households in Japan have personal computers.comparing this to the population size of Japan can help see the amount of people with access to the internet.

Age

2015 population census was of japan was released , under 15 years of age are about 16mil which is 12.6% of the total population. 76mil of the population is the age 15-64 years of age which is 60.7% of the total population and 3.3mil are 65 years and higher are 26.6%.

Geographic Cause

Japan is an island country located off the east coast of Asia. An island country is a country not connected to the actual continent itself. Japan is made up of many differnet islands instead of one big island. There are 4 main islands that make up Hawaii but there are other islands. Japan has a very mountainous and volcanic terrain. There are many dormant and active volcanos on the island. Even though the terrain is not ideal for farming, there are still many crops growing on the islands. The vegetation is not lacking despite the volcanos and rough terrain.

Nicole Andorf

Cultural Cause

According to the Japanese Statistics Bureau, MPHPA, and World Internet Project Japan, in 2001, 44% of the population was online, and 41% of that group were females. Additionally, figures point to declining disparity among internet access in various socioeconomic classes and gender. Additionally, figures show that younger Japanese individuals use the internet as compared to older Japanese individuals. All gaps are shown to be narrowing. A study produced at the University of Buffalo shows that the Japanese consider advanced ICTs a common commodity, not as necessary for advancement. [1]

Population

Japan is divided into territorial divisions and depending on which geographic area that you live in, and everyone either has internet or no one has internet.

According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, there are a total of 39 “Zero Broadband Areas” in Japan. This is where there is no broadband access for even a single household within the district. This means Japanese citizens cannot get broadband even if they wanted to because there is no broadband infrastructure in their neighborhood. For some territorial divisions the coverage is up to 99.8% of the people in this area have access to broadband. This leads to a digital divide, but the divide is more drastic at the ends of the curve depending on where you live.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications is aiming to improve broadband penetration in remote areas of Japan, but businesses aren’t exactly queuing up to provide expensive infrastructure to hook up remote islands and mountain villages. Japan has more than 4000 islands, 260 of which are inhabited. Japan’s land is also 73% mountainous or hilly, and whilst the population is concentrated mainly in the alluvial plains and coastal areas, there are significant populations living in remote valleys deep in the mountains mainly engaged in agriculture or forestry. It is difficult to justify building out a fiber based infrastructure to a remote island, or to a dead end mountain ravine community miles from anywhere. [2]

Possible solutions

The internet users in japan are increasing at an exponential rate but there are still areas demographically do not receive optimal broadband satellite communications in japan. A possible solution for this is to launch more satellites for those areas. Globally separated into categories of 58% female(most pronounced in Africa, Arab states and Asia-Pacific), 60% rural,poor, illiterate and elderly are offline. ITU provides idea/plans for these focus groups to increase the amount of internet users. Rural areas need to implement a low-cost,given the lower household income is lower in these areas, another idea for rural areas is to provide pubic building that will have available internet access.