Despite a formidable growth in broadband penetration in the past year getting
affordable broadband to areas currently regarded as commercially unviable
continues to be a "challenge". Some as a solution considers aggregating public
sector demand. However, it is unclear whether it will provide a big enough
incentive for private sector companies to invest in bringing broadband to areas
currently without high-speed Net access. The eRural approach addresses the
sharing of experience on the development of a range of public and private
sector services, the stimulation of local demand, and planning and installation
of enabling broadband infrastructure. Such an approach would go a long way to
ensure "wider adoption, broader availability and an extension of IST
applications and services in all economic and public services and in the
society as a whole"
Thus, the eRural research will need to adopt an integrated and
multidisciplinary approach across the whole value chain from Technology to
Services and Awareness that will cover all RTD&D effort.
To do this there is a need for a specific "eRural" Strategic Objective in both
the FP6 and FP7 IST Programmes to eliminate the European Urban/Rural Digital
Divide by 2010. This will be the "eRural" element of the i2010 ICT programme
that will proactively use ICT to make Rural Europe an integral part of the
"most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy" by 2010.
This section of the website is dedicated to giving information about all the
components of this 'eRural' strategy.
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