BitDepth#1383
MARK LYNDERSAY
SINCE THE last compilation of the Network Readiness Index, TT has dropped seven places from 85 to 92. In 2020, this country was ranked at 81.
The index has been compiled by Washington's Portulans Institute since 2019, continuing a project that was first published by the World Economic Forum as part of its Global Information Technology Report.
The index is calculated across four pillars: technology, people, governance and impact. Each of these top-level pillars is further analysed using sub-categories.
Technology is measured according to access, content created and the implementation of future technologies.
The people factor is measured according to how individuals use technology, how businesses use ICT and how governments invest in and deploy technology.
Governance rankings are based on trust in the networked economy, the extent of government regulation and policy implementation and the inclusion of challenged communities.
Impact measures the economic value of the networked economy on a country, the value it delivers and the country's alignment with the UN's sustainable development goals.
TT has traditionally done between poorly and middling in global rankings because of a national aversion to consistent, transparent data collection and publication of all its information, with a special lack of emphasis on anything that might be viewed as a performance indicator.
Global digital transformation commitments have been aggressive since March 2020, so the only real surprise in this year's ranking is how slow and incremental the slide has been. It's possible that this drop is being cushioned by countries that are even worse at data gathering than we are.
The 2022 analysis of this country has been done, for instance, using adult literacy information from 2010, presumably because that's what's available.
So instead of pouting about this slide into digital transformation mediocrity, let's have a look at what's working.
TT is first, for instance, among populations covered by 3G mobile networks with a perfect score of 100. We are equally tops in e-commerce legislation with another first placing and perfect score.
We are, however, second to last with a score of zero for affordable and clean energy. It should also come as no surprise that TT scores just 20.81 in cybersecurity, ranking at 114 overall.
In a hierarchy that sees the first 48 ranked nations being either high-income or upper-middle-income economies, TT is the only high-income nation in the lowest 47 grouping.
The country's profile suggests a fat, happy and exceedingly well-connected consumer economy, producing and exporting little to nothing ICT-related, participating marginally in the global ICT marketplace of products and ideas, fiddling with social networks (score: 73.13) while ignoring digital engagement in education (score: 31.07).
Other interesting scores below 20 include: enterprise spending on research and development (16.77), use of open data (19.12), .tt internet domain registrations
