Iceland scores high in ICT

Iceland has placed 19^th out of 143 countries in the 2015 Networked Readiness Index (NRI). This index is part of the 2015 Global Information Technology Report produced by the World Economic Forum and published yesterday.

The report, published yearly since 2001, analyses the world of information and communication technologies (ICTs). The NRI is a list of countries assessed and ranked on their ability to leverage ICTs to “enhance competitiveness, enable development and bring progress to all levels of society”.

Each country receives score out of 7 for each of ten criteria grouped into four “sub-indices”. Iceland’s overall score is 5.4 (ranking: 19/143). The ranking is led by Singapore (6.0), followed by Finland (6.0) and Sweden (5.8). The three countries with the lowest NRI scores are Burundi, Guinea and Chad.

The four sub-indices are:

• Environment – how ICT-friendly a country’s market and regulatory framework is.
• Readiness – how prepared a country is to make good use of ICT infrastructure and digital content.
• Usage – how much individuals, business and governments make efforts to increase ICT use, as well as actual ICT use.
• Impact – the broad economic and social impacts of ICT in boosting competitiveness and wellbeing.

Iceland performs particularly well on the ‘Infrastructure and digital content’ (7.0) and ‘Individual usage’ (6.5) criteria but lets itself down on ‘Economic impacts’ (4.7) and ‘Government usage’ (4.5). ‘Government usage’ refers to the importance that governments place on carrying out ICT policies and implementing their visions for ICT development, and takes into account the number of government services provided online.

Iceland’s 19^th place is identical to its position on the 2014 NRI list.

Iceland scores full marks in 'Infrastructure and digital content'. Photo: AFP