Federated Farmers have commented on a lack of increased funding in the 2010 Budget for Rural Broadband
“We are enthusiastic about the prospect of broadband but remain concerned Government is still prioritising urban over rural. While Federated Farmers lobbying won more funds for rural broadband, it’s still inequitable to what’s being committed to urban broadband."

Opinion

The Government have allocated $1.5Bn for urban broadband (around $436 pp) and $252M for rural broadband (around $439 pp) over six years.  Considering that rural broadband is, by its very nature, considerably more expensive to provide than urban broadband, and that the 14% of New Zealanders living in rural locations contribute 66% of the country's merchandise exports, we agree with Federated Farmers that this is inequitable.  We think that the investment in rural infrastructure, such as rural broadband, should be on the basis of equal access to broadband rather than equal government funding.

What do you think?

A high 84% of rural Franklin addresses are connected to the Internet as well as around 80% of town addresses. But more rural dwellers are wanting a high speed service (69%) compared to townies (around 56%). These are some of the key results coming out of the Franklin Rural Broadband Demand Survey commissioned by the Enterprise Franklin Development Trust.

Why was this study important?

The Rural Broadband Initiative (RBI) is the Government's response to concerns that its $1.5Bn ultra fast broadband investment for urban areas will create a "digital divide" between urban and rural New Zealand. Spending $252M on providing high speed broadband to around 14% of our population and businesses that account for 66% of our merchandise exports may not seem quite equitable