Number of  cell phone subscribers to hit 4 billion this year, UN  says

 
 
 
26-09-2008 (New York)

Hamadoun Touré,  
Secretary-General of the ITU
©  ITU 
The number of mobile cellular  subscribers worldwide will reach the 4 billion 
mark by the end of 2008, the head  of the United Nations International 
Telecommunications Union (ITU) announced  yesterday.
The number of subscribers has  surged nearly 25 per cent annually for the 
past eight years. Mobile penetration  stood at only 12 per cent in 2000, growing 
to reach over 60 per cent by the end  of 2008. 

“The fact that 4 billion subscribers have been registered  worldwide 
indicates that it is technically feasible to connect the world to the  benefits of ICT 
[information and communication technology] and that it is a  visible business 
opportunity,” ITU Secretary-General Hamadoun Touré said in New  York at a 
high-level event on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), eight  anti-poverty 
targets agreed upon by world leaders in 2000. 

“Clearly,  ICTs have the potential to act as catalysts to achieve the 2015 
targets of the  MDGs,” he added. 

The ITU emphasized the need to carefully interpret  data. A 61 per cent 
penetration rate does not mean in reality that every other  person in the world is 
using a mobile phone; rather, the statistics reflect the  number of 
subscriptions, not people. Double counting could occur if people have  multiple cellular 
subscriptions, while some could be sharing their phone with  others. 

The agency also cautioned that penetration rates vary by region  and even 
within countries. 

Rapidly developing economies such as Brazil,  Russia, India and China are 
driving the growth in the number of cellular  subscribers, with these nations 
alone accounting for over 1.3 billion of them by  the end of 2008.







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