The ITU ICT SDG indicators

Digital skills are crucially important in leveraging ICTs to boost development. Yet data for such skills remain very scant. Only 78 countries submit data, and rarely for all five categories. Based on this limited dataset, communication/collaboration skills appear to be the most prevalent, with a median of 50 per cent and an average that lies between 31 and 65 per cent for most countries.

The category with the second highest median is problem solving, followed by safety and content creation. In the category with the lowest median, information/data literacy, there was considerable variation between countries.

Another way to explore these data is through the breadth of skills reported in the different countries. The 74 countries that provided data in at least three skill areas varied widely in this respect. Forty-seven countries reported averages of at least 25 per cent in multiple areas, 22 reported averages of over 50 per cent in multiple areas and only five reported averages of over 75 per cent in multiple areas.

The relatively low level of skills in countries providing data contrasts against their high share of overall Internet use – 86 per cent. This gap between individuals using the Internet and those with digital skills demonstrates that many may be using the Internet without being able to fully benefit from it or avoid its dangers.

​ ​​​​​​​​​​Indicator 4.4.1 is the global indicator for SDG Target 4.4: By 2030, substantially increase the number of youth and adults who have relevant skills, including tec​​hnical and vocational skills, for employment, decent jobs and entrepreneurship. ​ The data can be found in the ITU DataHub and in the UN SDG Indicators Database. The meta​data​ are also available on the UN website. For more SDG analysis, visit the Sustainable Development Goals Report 2023: Towards a rescue plan for people and planet (Special edition)​.

Globally, 73 per cent of the population aged 10 and over owned a mobile phone in 2022, up from 67 per cent in 2019. On this trend, universal ownership will not be reached by 2030, but it most likely will be in sight. While in the high-income countries in Australia, New Zealand, Europe and Northern America virtually everyone already owned a mobile phone, in Central and Southern Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, this was only true for about six in ten people.  

Percentage of individuals who own a mobile phone, by sex, 2022 

In most developing countries, mobile broadband (3G or above) is the main way — and often the only way — to connect to the Internet. This kind of access is available to 95% of the world population. Bridging the “coverage gap”, that is, connecting the remaining five percent still off the grid is proving difficult: since crossing the 90% threshold in 2018, global 3G coverage has increased only by four percentage points. ​

In Sub-Saharan Africa, the gap constitutes 18%, predominantly affecting the population of central and western Africa. The coverage gap is almost the same in LDCs and LLDCs, falling short of SDG Target 9.c to “significantly increase access to information and communications technology and strive to provide universal and affordable access to the Internet in least developed countries by 2020.”

Between 2015 and 2022, 4G network coverage doubled to reach 88% of the world’s population; but, as for previous technologies, growth is slowing down. 4G technology is now available to more than 90% of the population in most of the regions, except Latin America and the Caribbean (88% of the population), Northern Africa and Western Asia (83%), Oceania (excluding Australia and New Zealand, 59%) and Sub-Saharan Africa (49%).

In many countries older-generation networks are being switched off in favour of networks that are more efficient and allow the development of a digital ecosystem compatible with 5G. This is particularly the case for 3G, which is often shut down so that the freed-up spectrum can be re-used for 5G, while keeping 2G for older legacy devices. This is the case for most European operators, who are planning to have their 3G networks switched off by December 2025, and for the Asia-Pacific region. However, in other regions of the world the path is less clear, mainly because 2G and 3G networks retain a significant presence. This is the case notably in lower-income countries, where both technologies are an important means of communication. In those countries, the main obstacles to 5G deployment include high infrastructure costs, device affordability, and regulatory and adoption barriers.

Preliminary data show that 19% of the global population was covered by a 5G network in 2021. The highest roll-out was in Europe at 52%, followed by the Americas (38%) and the Asia-Pacific region (16%).

The world takes a small step towards digital gender parity

On a global scale, 69 per cent of men are using the Internet, compared with 63 per cent of women. This means there are 259 million more men than women using the Internet in 2022.

Gender parity is deemed achieved when the gender parity score, defined as the female percentage divided by the male percentage, stands between 0.98 and 1.02. Over the last three years, the world has been taking small steps towards gender parity, moving from 0.90 in 2019 to 0.92 in 2022. The gender parity score, however, only provides a partial picture, because it represents the ratio of two percentages. Measured by the absolute difference between the numbers of men and women online, the gender gap actually increased by 20 million. Furthermore, while women account for roughly half of the population, they account for a disproportionate – and increasing – share of the global offline population: women now outnumber male non-users by 18 per cent, up from 11 per cent in 2019.