'Digital divide' narrowing fast, World Bank says

The "digital divide" between rich and poor nations is narrowing fast, the World Bank said, calling into question a costly United Nations campaign to bring hi-tech telecommunications to the developing world.

As some 1,700 international experts gathered in Geneva to prepare for the UN's World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), the World Bank said in a report that telecommunications services to poor countries were growing at an explosive rate.

"The digital divide is rapidly closing," the report said. "People in the developing world are getting more access at an incredible rate - far faster than they got access to new technologies in the past."

Half the world's population now enjoys access to a fixed-line telephone, the report said and 77 per cent to a mobile network - surpassing a WSIS campaign goal that calls for 50 per cent access by 2015.