Half of world's population now has a mobile
 

The number of mobile phone users world soared to over 3.3 billion by the end of 2007 the International Telecommunications Union has said in a report.

Africa showed the strongest gains over the past two years and more than two thirds of all mobile subscribers were from developing countries by the end of 2007, the ITU said.

This is 'a positive trend that suggests that developing countries are catching up," the report said.

Mobile subscription growth stood at 39 percent annually in Africa between 2005-2007, and 28 percent in Asia over the same period.

India and China added 154 million and 143 million new subscribers respectively.

The global annual average growth rate stood at 22 percent, the ITU said.

Mobile phones are eclipsing traditional fixed lines and in Africa they account for nearly 90 percent of all telephone subscribers, the report said.

While developing countries have made great strides in mobile growth, a significant 'digital divide' remains for Internet use and particularly the availability of broadband connections, it noted.

Some countries have made progress and the ITU highlighted Chile, Senegal and Turkey as states where almost all Internet subscribers have now gone high speed.

Yet we still have appeals on tv every day to send them money for water ?? :helpme

That's for the other 50% who do not have one...

The world is a strange place. Half the population has a cell phone, but 25% of the population still spends 4+ hours a day, every day, looking for clean drinking water. It is a pretty sad.

Well now they can call all their friends when they find the clean water :thumbsup

Which is a bit scary if you think of that the majority of them is uncapable of decent communication and suffering from the totally insane use of ring tones:)

It's joyous to intentionally no-longer-own one. Ohh, yes.

Ahh, feel the radiation! Feel it! Oh wait, whats that???

Geez thats a lot of phones.

Cell Phones are a good market.. I just wish more people had iPhones...

and this is why we started http://mobile-translations.com/ ;)