August 4, 1999 Web posted at: 12:23 p.m. EDT (1623 GMT) by Elizabeth de Bony

From...

BRUSSELS, Belgium (IDG) -- The average number of households accessing the Internet almost doubled in the European Union's 15 countries -- but only to a mere 8.3 percent -- between 1997 and 1998, according to a recent Eurobarometer survey from the European Commission.

Northern residents, however, are far more plugged in than their southern counterparts, according to the study, which is called "Measuring Information Society 1998." Swedes come out on top with 39.6 percent of the population accessing the Internet at home, the survey found. Sweden is followed by Denmark (24.6 percent) and the Netherlands (19.6 percent).

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Scandinavian countries are widely reported to have more Internet users on a per capita basis than any other country, including the U.S. The U.S. had almost 52 percent of the world's Internet users in 1998, according to the Computer Industry Almanac and is expected to grow from 76.5 million users to more than 207 million Internet users in 2005.

At the low end of the European Union (EU) scale, only 2.9 percent of all Greeks access the Internet at home, Eurobarometer found, followed by 3.4 percent of households in Portugal, 3.9 percent in France and 5 percent in Spain. U.K. Internet use in the home stands at 10.7 percent.

While 27 million people use the Internet from their home in the EU, approximately 22.4 million use it at work, representing 13.3 percent of the working population. In countries where home Internet use is high, so is business use of the Net, the survey indicates.

A lack of need was the main reason reported for the low interest in Internet services: 55 percent of respondents said they had no need for such services; 24.2 percent said the services were too expensive; 21.5 percent said they did not have the necessary equipment; and the remaining 18.2 percent found the whole issue too complicated.

Regarding basic computer use, an average of 30.8 percent of EU citizens use PCs at home, again with the majority of use in the northern countries: 59.8 percent of all Swedes use computers at home followed by the Dutch (58.8 percent) and the Danes (56.7 percent). At the other end of the scale only 12.2 percent of Greek citizens use computers in their home, while 18.4 percent of all Portuguese, 22.8 percent of all French and 26.6 percent of all Italians use computers at home.

The survey also found that 30.2 percent of all Europeans have mobile phones. The main users are Finland at 64.4 percent of the population and Sweden at 60.3 percent, followed by Italy at 44.2 percent. Mobile-phone penetration is the lowest in Germany, the Netherlands and France where mobile phone use averaged, respectively, 19.4 percent, 24.2 percent and 25.5 percent.

The European Commission's Eurobarometer reports are published by the EU's General Directorate X.

Elizabeth de Bony is Brussels correspondent for the IDG News Service.