A frustrating screen for people with poor internet connections.

 

 

Internet access on most Manitoba farms remains second-rate when compared with what's available in urban centres. Despite improvements over the last number of years, on-farm high-speed connections, where available, are often slower and more expensive relative to internet access in nonrural areas.

Curtis McRae, who farms in the St. Andrews area, says producers are dealing with an information disadvantage.

"There's a huge gap in service. We are so far behind. Anything we do online has to be text based. Anything with a visual aid, such as a picture, you have to download overnight," he says.

McRae, who's the chair of Keystone Agricultural Producers' Rural Development Committee, says the infrastructure that's already in place for internet access at rural hospitals and schools could be used to provide improved internet access to rural landowners.

"Rural people understand the infrastructure required to get high-speed out to us is not just a drop in a bucket, but we know that hospitals and schools are places that require high-speed to better the next generation and to keep the occupants of this province healthy," he says. "Most rural people live within 20 miles of a school or hospital, so we might be able to provide access to 80 percent of the populace."

He says improved internet access would be a public good.

"The government wants to run an internet-based economy. That's the way the world is trading and the way that everybody's doing business," he says. "We can't do things through the same means that every other business does. Our problem is that we're located outside the urban centres, so distance becomes the issue."

"As far as building our economy, anytime a Manitoba farmer can market his or her goods more effectively, more efficiently, it puts more money into our economy and everybody benefits from that," says McRae.

~ Friday, February 11, 2011 ~