Figure 2: Fastest Internet plan by download speed for no more than 5% of monthly income in select Caribbean countries in 2015 (ICT Pulse)<\/p><\/div>\n

In Belize, Suriname, Antigua and Barbuda, and Saint Lucia, 5% of the average resident\u2019s income would purchase the slowest Internet plan: in Belize, 256\u00a0kbps; in Antigua and Barbuda, 1\u00a0Mbps; whilst in the other countries, 2\u00a0Mbps. On the other hand, in the Cayman Islands, 4.9% of a resident\u2019s monthly income could secure a 100\u00a0Mbps plan.<\/p>\n

Also, it should be noted that the ISPs examined in Dominica, Guyana, Jamaica, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines did not offer any Internet plans that satisfied the 5% criterion; hence they were excluded from this exercise.<\/p>\n

Is broadband Internet service more affordable?<\/h3>\n

Since 2014 and across most of the countries reviewed, there has been some change in the portion of monthly income a 2Mbps Internet plan would consume, as reflected in Figure 3. The exceptions are Anguilla, Aruba, Belize, Curacao, and the Turks and Caicos Islands., where no significant change in was recorded.<\/p>\n

Over the past three assessments, between 2013 and 2015, the most significant changes were registered:<\/p>\n

\n
• Belize, where the portion of income spent decreased by -14.5%<\/li>\n
• Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, where the portion of income spent decreased by -6.4%, and<\/li>\n
• Suriname, where the portion of income spent decreased by -5.1%.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

  With the exception of the Bahamas, the British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Guyana, and the Turks and Caicos Islands (as above), where the ISPs were not offering a 2\u00a0Mbps plan in 2015, a net decrease in the proportion of monthly income spent was recorded in all other countries.<\/p>\n

  

  Figure 3: Comparison of percentage of month income consumed by an Internet plan with an advertised download speed of 2 Mbps between 2013 and 2015 in select Caribbean countries (Source: ICT Pulse)<\/p><\/div>\n

  Summary<\/h3>\n

  Generally, fixed broadband Internet is becoming more affordable in the Caribbean as the portion of monthly income it consumes decreases. However in some instances, 5% of an individual\u2019s monthly income might not be sufficient to purchase a fixed broadband Internet plan, or it would be just adequate to secure the slowest plan.<\/p>\n

   <\/p>\n

  ______________<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  A 2015 update of the extent to which broadband Internet service is affordable across the Caribbean. Following our latest review of Internet speed and pricing across the Caribbean, which we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":88081,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7,17,11,6,18],"tags":[61,63,15],"class_list":["post-76686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-broadband","category-caribbean","category-ict-tech","category-internet","category-telecoms-2","tag-snapshot-series","tag-survey","tag-trends","et-has-post-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/Camera-Flash-Philip-Dehm-flickr.jpg?fit=640%2C427&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2iE1G-jWS","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76686"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76686\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76688,"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76686\/revisions\/76688"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ict-pulse.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}