Access to broadband could be the universal catalyst that lifts developing countries out of poverty and enables access to healthcare, education and basic social services, the United Nations (UN) Broadband Commission for Digital Development has said.

The commission, which met in Dublin in late March on the back of an invitation from Digicel Group chairperson and one of the founding members of the group Denis O’Brien, comprised some of the world’s most prominent leaders from the technology sector, government, academia and UN agencies.

“The long-sought panacea to human poverty may at last be within our reach in the form of broadband networks that empower all countries to take their place in the global economy, overcoming traditional barriers like geography, language and resource constraints,” O’Brien said in a statement.

Mobile broadband had become the fastest-growing technology in human history, particularly in developing regions, he noted.

There are about seven-billion recorded mobile phone subscriptions – roughly the world’s total population – and over 2.7-billion people now ‘online’, with active mobile broadband subscriptions now exceeding 2.1-billion.

The developing world accounts for 90% of global net additions for mobile cellular and 82% of global net additions of new Internet users since early 2010, when the commission was established.

“That translates to 820-million new Internet users and two-billion new mobile broadband subscribers in developing countries in just four years,” added International Telecommunications Union secretary-general Dr Hamadoun Touré.

It is expected that, in the world’s 200 biggest cities, the number of connected devices will increase from an average of 400 devices per square kilometre to over 13 000 devices per square kilometre by 2016.

Touré urged the commissioners to consider defining a ‘Broadband for Millennium Development Goals Acceleration Framework’, which could be presented to UN secretary- general Ban Ki-moon for endorsement at the next meeting in September.

“For the first time in history, broadband gives us the power to end extreme poverty and put our planet on a new, sustainable development course,” Touré said.

However, with 95% of global telecommunications infrastructure funded by the private sector, better incentives were urgently needed if investment were to expand in line with the impending exponential growth of connected users and Internet of Things data streams, O’Brien warned, urging governments and international financing bodies to remove current barriers to investment.

In many countries, telecommunications infrastructure now needs to be doubled every year.

“No other sector is facing a similar capital expenditure investment challenge. We need to identify viable new operating and financing models,” said Carlos Jarque, who attended the meeting as the representative of commission cochairperson Carlos Slim Helú.