Joint WPIIS/WPIE workshop on the Economic and Social Impacts of Broadband Communications: from ICT Measurement to Policy Implications

DTI Conference Centre, 1 Victoria Street

London SW1H 0ET, United Kingdom

22 May 2007

The workshop reviewed studies of the impacts of broadband roll-out and use: a) on economic performance at aggregate level and in the business sector, and b) on the geographical distribution of economic activity and employment, on content producers and users, and on households. It covered recent and ongoing analysis for a wide range of OECD countries.

The work presented and the outcomes of the workshop feed directly into analysis of economic and social impacts of broadband for the 2008 Ministerial on the Future of the Internet Economy.

The morning session focused on reviewing recent evidence and ongoing work examining the impact of broadband on productivity and economic performance.
The afternoon session first focused on ICT-enabled changes in production location and some of the impacts on employment. This was followed by a review of the impacts of broadband roll-out on digital content, households and time-use, and on e-inclusion.

Agenda

Introduction: OECD Secretariat  

Morning session: The productivity impacts

Chair: Tony Clayton (Office for National Statistics, UK), Chair WPIIS

The macroeconomic impacts, and setting the scene

• Bart van Ark (University of Groningen and The Conference Board)   

The microeconomic impacts – preliminary evidence from the micro data project

• Overview of the project: Eric Bartelsman (Free University of Amsterdam)
• George van Leeuwen (Central Bureau of Statistics, Netherlands)
• Hans-Olof Hagen (Statistics Sweden)  

Measuring the economic impact of broadband in the US – a panel data study at the zip-code level

• Marvin Sirbu (Carnegie-Mellon University, US)  

The economic impacts of broadband in the Australian context

• Judith Winternitz (additional paper) (Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Australia)  

The use of information networks and productivity

• Kazu Motohashi (University of Tokyo, Japan)  

Focusing on the “C” in ICT

• Guy Gellatly (Statistics Canada)  

The impact of informational mobility

• Petri Rouvinen (additional paper) (ETLA, Finland)  

Wrap-up of the morning session and discussion

Afternoon session: The impacts on globalisation, employment, content and households

Chair: Jean-Jacques Sahel (DTI, UK)

Globalisation, ICT-enabled offshoring, employment

• Peter Boegh Nielsen (Statistics Denmark), International sourcing surveys
• Ursula Huws (Analytica), Impact of broadband on employment: offshoring, outsourcing and telework  

Digital content

• Heather Hopkins (Hitwise, UK)
• John Horrigan (Pew Internet Project, US)
• Martin Fornefeld (MICUS Management Consulting, Germany)  

Households and time use; e-inclusion

• Heidi Seybert (Eurostat)
• Anik Lacroix (Statistics Canada)
• HyoJin Yang (National Internet Development Agency of Korea)
• Ewen McKinnon (Digital Inclusion Team, UK)  

Comments on the impact of broadband on digital content, households and time-use

• Len Waverman (London Business School)  

Wrap-up of the afternoon session and discussion

Policy implications: Discussion