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We examine the effects of information and communications technology (ICT) on international trade in emerging markets. Using panel data for forty emerging market economies (EMEs) from 1995 to 2010, we estimate fixed effects models of exports and imports with ICT as the main explanatory variable of interest. The empirical results overwhelmingly suggest that Internet subscriptions and Internet hosts have significant positive effects on both exports and imports in EMEs. Thus, the trade-enhancing effect of ICT does not depend on ICT infrastructure or ICT capability per se but on its use. This result is robust to a number of sensitivity checks.

This paper examines the role of financial development and financial structure in explaining cross-country diffusion of information communication technology (ICT). Using panel data for 76 emerging and advanced countries for the period 1990-2003, the paper finds that credit and stock market development tends to foster ICT development. Financial structure, however, does not appear to have any significant relationship with ICT development. The conclusions of the paper highlight the role of financial development in the market for knowledge-based products, and are consistent with theoretical predictions. The finding that financial development is an important determinant of ICT development implies that countries with underdeveloped financial markets may continue to lag behind in the use of ICT.

Access to information, and communications technologies has become crucial to a sustainable agenda of economic development, and poverty reduction, and yet access remains concentrated in a few regions and population groups, with the contours of this new \" digital divide \" closely following, and supplementing existing income, and economic divides. However, technological innovations, economic pressures, and regulatory reforms, are making access to information, and communications technologies more affordable, and, providing opportunities to close the digital divide. This discussion paper outlines a number of policy, and regulatory measures, including incentives to attract investors to high cost, or challenging areas, that can be used under different scenarios, to close the digital divide. While Bank Group experience shows an increasing number of projects with specific universal access components, this paper proposes alternatives for Bank Group support for universal access policies, through an appropriate mix of technical assistance, and investments.

Purpose - This study aims to assess whether similar user populations in the Internet produce similar geographical traffic destination patterns on a per-country basis.Design methodology approach - The authors collected a country-wide NetFlow trace, which encompasses the whole Spanish academic network. Such a trace comprises several similar campus networks in terms of population size and structure. To compare their behaviors, the authors propose a mixture model, which is primarily based on the Zipf-Mandelbrot power law to capture the heavy-tailed nature of the per-country traffic distribution. Then, factor analysis is performed to understand the relation between the response variable, number of bytes or packets per day, with dependent variables such as the source IP network, traffic direction, and country.Findings - Surprisingly, the results show that the geographical distribution is strongly dependent on the source IP network. Furthermore, even though there are thousands of users in a typical campus network, it turns out that the aggregation level which is required to observe a stable geographical pattern is even larger.Practical implications - Based on these findings, conclusions drawn for one network cannot be directly extrapolated to different ones. Therefore, ISPs' traffic measurement campaigns should include an extensive set of networks to cope with the space diversity, and also encompass a significant period of time due to the large transient time.Originality value - Current state of the art includes some analysis of geographical patterns, but not comparisons between networks with similar populations. Such comparison can be useful for the design of content distribution networks and the cost-optimization of peering agreements.

Contribution of Information and Communication Technologies to Growth is part of the World Bank Working Paper series. These papers are published to communicate the results of the Bank’s ongoing research and to stimulate public discussion. The worldwide development of information and communication technology (ICT) has accelerated dramatically over the past decade. Technological advances and increased competition have led to falling prices for ICT goods and services, which has provided a strong incentive to replace other forms of capital and labor with information technology equipment. Increased ICT production and use has the potential to create job opportunities, transfer skills, and increase efficiency and transparency in politics and business, and therefore, contribute to economic growth. This paper focuses on the linkage between ICT and output growth. It summarizes findings in the literature on the contribution of information and communication technology to economic growth arising from capital deepening and increases in total factor productivity. The paper contains: the methodologies used to evaluate the different ways ICT influences productivity growth; a critical assessment of the magnitude of ICT’s contribution to growth in various countries; a summary of the key factors that increase and obstruct ICT expansion; and an outline of the challenges developing countries face in maximizing ICT’s contribution to growth and policy recommendations aimed at surmounting these challenges.

With some 6 billion mobile subscriptions in use worldwide, around three-quarters of the world's inhabitants now have access to a mobile phone. Mobiles are arguably the most ubiquitous modern technology: in some developing countries, more people have access to a mobile phone than to a bank account, electricity, or even clean water. Mobile communications now offer major opportunities to advance human development from providing basic access to education or health information to making cash payments to stimulating citizen involvement in democratic processes. The developing world is 'more mobile' than the developed world. In the developed world, mobile communications have added value to legacy communication systems and have supplemented and expanded existing information flows. However, the developing world is following a different, 'mobile first' development trajectory. Many mobile innovations such as multi-SIM card phones, low-value recharges, and mobile payments have originated in poorer countries and are spreading from there. New mobile applications that are designed locally and rooted in the realities of the developing world will be much better suited to addressing development challenges than applications transplanted from elsewhere. In particular, locally developed applications can address developing-country concerns such as digital literacy and affordability. This 2012 edition of the World Bank's information and communications for development report analyzes the growth and evolution of mobile telephony, and the rise of data-based services delivered to handheld devices, including apps. The report explores the consequences for development of the emerging 'app economy.' It summarizes current thinking and seeks to inform the debate on the use of mobile phones for development. This report looks at key ecosystem-based applications in agriculture, health, financial services, employment, and government, with chapters devoted to each. Avec environ six millions d’abonnements actifs dans le monde, ce sont trois quarts des habitants du globe qui ont désormais accès au téléphone mobile. Les téléphones mobiles constituent sans doute la technologie moderne la plus répandue : dans certains pays en développement l’on compte un nombre plus élevé de personnes ayant accès à un téléphone portable qu’à un compte bancaire, à l’électricité ou même à l’eau potable. Les systèmes de communications mobiles présentent des possibilités énormes de faire avancer le développement humain, à commencer par l’élargissement de l’accès à l’éducation de base ou aux informations sanitaires, en passant par les paiements en espèces et l’incitation du citoyen à s’engager dans les processus démocratiques. Les applications mobiles donnent de l’autonomie à leurs utilisateurs et contribuent à améliorer leur qualité de vie et leurs moyens d’existence tout en renforçant l’ensemble de l’économie. Le rapport montre que les applications mobiles permettent non seulement d’autonomiser les individus, mais aussi d’avoir des répercussions positives sur la croissance, l’entrepreneuriat et la productivité à l’échelle de l’économie toute entière. L’édition 2012 du rapport Information et communications au service du développement analyse la croissance et l’évolution de la téléphonie mobile et la montée en puissance des services basés sur les données acheminés vers les appareils portatifs, notamment les applications. Le rapport examine les conséquences de l’économie émergente des applications sur le développement. Il fait la synthèse de la réflexion actuelle et tente d’enrichir le débat sur l’utilisation du téléphone mobile au service du développement. Il passe en revue des applications clés du secteur dans les domaines de l’agriculture, la santé, les services financiers, l’emploi et l’administration publique ; des chapitres entiers sont consacrés à chacun de ces domaines. Ce n’est plus le téléphone lui-même qui retient l’attention, mais plutôt la manière dont il est utilisé, ainsi que le contenu et les applications auxquels le téléphone mobile permet d’accéder.

This chapter contains sections titled: Networking Multicast Reverse Path Forwarding and Routing Causality and Clocks Message Passing and RPC/RMI Web Services Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) Summary References

These two volumes analyze Japan from the Knowledge Economy perspective, covering a wide range of sector issues in development including the macro economic framework, education and skills training, the national innovation system, science and technology, information and communication technology, and infrastructure. While Volume 1 explores the four pillars of the \"Knowledge for Development\" framework, the second volume presents up-to-date case studies of outstanding Japanese private companies that each characterize different aspects of the Knowledge Economy.

Maize farmers in sub-Saharan Africa recently experienced unusual damage in their farms, attributed to the fall armyworm (FAW) Spodoptera frugiperda (J. E. Smith). This pest was first recorded in Africa in 2016, but detailed information on its distribution and damage and farmer's response in invaded areas are largely lacking. In this study, we determined FAW distribution, genetic diversity, host plants, crop damage, and farmers' responses. S. frugiperda was recorded in the 10 regions of Cameroon. Average percentage of infested plants and damage severity (on a scale of 1 to 5) were lowest-20.7 ± 7.4% and 2.1 ± 0.1 respectively-in the Sahelian regions and greatest-69.0 ± 4.3% and 3.1 ± 0.1 respectively-in the Western Highlands. Altitude did not influence FAW incidence and severity and its larvae infrequently co-occurred with maize stemborers on the same plants, suggesting possible direct and/or indirect competition between the two groups of maize pests. In response to this new threat to maize production, farmers have opted for the application of synthetic pesticides. Although our experiments were not designed to determine pesticide efficacy, as parameters such as time since application were not considered, our observations suggest lack of a drastic effect on S. frugiperda infestations on maize. There were two haplotypes of FAW co-occurring in Cameroon corresponding to the rice and corn strains and separated by 1.7% sequence divergence, which does not support the existence of cryptic species. S. frugiperda larvae were also recorded on Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench (10.6%), Solanum tuberosum L. (2.8%), Ipomoea batatas (L.) Lam. (1.9%), Saccharum officinarum L (0.8%), Phaseolus vulgaris L. (0.4%) and Gossypium hirsutum L. (1.9%). This study show that two strains are present in all agroecological zones in Cameroon, and probably in neighboring countries of central Africa sharing the same agroecologies. Management options should therefore consider the use of specific natural enemies and an informed decision of intervention based on strain capture and damage threshold, to avoid pesticide resistance that may arise from inadequate use of chemicals. Further studies should also be undertaken to assess the response of the two S. frugiperda strains to biopesticides and botanical insecticides.