This technical paper from the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) proposes a preliminary Arab Digital Agenda, a regional roadmap for using information and communication technology (ICT) to support implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development across the Arab region. Drawing on international models such as the EU's Digital Agenda for Europe and Latin America's eLAC agendas, and building on the 2007-2011 Arab ICT Strategy, it organizes proposed regional action around five thematic pillars: ICT infrastructure, governance, digital economy, ICT and society, and ICT and culture.
Key Insights
By end-2017, average internet-user penetration across Arab countries stood at 43.7%, close to the Asia-Pacific average of 41.3% but below the global average of 48%, ranging from under 30% in Iraq and Libya to over 90% in Qatar, Bahrain and the UAE.
Fixed broadband penetration in the Arab region averaged only 4.7% in 2016, below the developing-country average of 7.1%, even as Qatar recorded the world's highest fiber-to-the-home penetration rate at 93.7%.
Only about 0.6% of the region's population outside GCC states has access to fiber networks, and the minimum international internet bandwidth per user in the region was just 38 kbps in 2016, far below the 53 kbps developing-country average.
Mobile broadband penetration in Arab countries reached 45.2% in 2016, still below international benchmarks.
On the UN's 2018 E-Government Development Index, the UAE led Arab countries at 0.83 (global rank 21) and Bahrain followed at 0.81 (rank 26), while Yemen (0.22) and Mauritania (0.23) ranked lowest regionally.
Widespread digital financial services could bring 2 billion people and 200 million micro, small and medium enterprises into the formal financial system worldwide and add 6% to emerging-economy GDP by 2025, yet 467 million people, 61% of the Middle East and North Africa population, remained excluded from formal finance as of 2014.
The financial-inclusion gap in the Arab region reached 71% of the population overall and 78% among women specifically.
Only 64.2% of Arab youth aged 15-24 used the internet in 2017, below the developing-country average of 67.3% and the global average of 70.6%.
The gender gap in internet use in the Arab region stood at 17.3% in 2017, an improvement from 19.2% in 2013, even as the global gender gap widened over the same period.
Digital adoption among small and medium enterprises remains low, with only about 18% of surveyed UAE firms, 15% in Saudi Arabia and 7% in Egypt maintaining an online presence, compared with 40% in France and 60% in the United States.
Arabic-language content makes up only 0.6% of web pages worldwide, despite very high regional social media usage, with WhatsApp penetration reaching 95% in the UAE and 88% in Saudi Arabia.
The Agenda consolidates 101 identified actions across its five pillars, building on and expanding the three-pillar structure of the 2007-2011 Arab ICT Strategy to better align with the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda.
