A recent study conducted by Facebook's Internet.org shows the only 40 percent of the entire global population has access to the internet.
Despite the notion that the internet has made the world smaller through interconnectivity, a significant portion of the world's entire populations has never accessed the World Wide Web once, according to International Business Times. The report from Internet.org also highlighted some of the major reason to this problem.
Internet access on developed countries is projected to be around 78 percent, however only 32 percent of the population from developing and underdeveloped countries has access to the internet. The study also added that one of the main factors affecting internet growth within these countries is the price of internet service.
According to the report, Internet access growth has been declining in the last four consecutive years. The recorded growth rate in 2014 falls to a stunning 6.6 percent compared to the 14.7 percent growth in 2010. Some experts say that the target of bringing the internet into 3 billion people by 2015 would be an impossible task given the current growth rate.
One of the biggest factor the hinder internet growth is expensive data plans especially in developing countries.
The study added that only half of the global population can afford the 250MB monthly data plan. However, if the cap will be lowered down to 100MB this will make the internet affordable to almost 80 percent of the global population. Furthermore, lowering the cap to 20MB means that the 90 percent of the global population can afford the internet, according to PC Mag.
The report stated that, "In locations like Sub-Saharan Africa where 69 percent of people live on less than $2 per day, only 53 percent of the population can afford the Internet with a cap of 20MB, an amount that provides just 1 to 2 hours of Web browsing a month."