Size and structure of the Colombian information economy

Colombia is a country of north of South America with a population near to 42,888,592 (June 2005 according to the Census 2005) and an area of 1,141,748 sq. km. with tropical climate along coast and eastern plains; cooler in highlands.The Colombian economy in 2006 had good results, the same behavior since 2002 with a 4% annual average growth rate. On the other hand, from the demand perspective, the Colombian economys growth in 2006 was evident in the 26.89% increase of gross formation of capital, the 7.85% exports upsurge due to higher international oil and oil derivatives prices, and the 5.63% expansion of final consumption that led to a 9.88% internal demand increase. The sector with the greatest share was mining (31.9%). The GDP in 2006 was a 6.8% and the inflation rate was a 5.96% for 2007.The IS/ICT economy in Colombia, according to a DANEs (2003)1 study, there were 1,766,000 computers in Colombia at the time of the study; 93.4% of them were operative and 44.7% were connected to Internet. Computer use was greatest in higher education (100%), the public sector (93.4%), and the manufacturing industry (76.6%). Concerning the use of operating systems, Microsoft Windows 95/98 (65.8%) and Windows 2000 (20.4%) were the most widely used, while Windows NT (5.7%) was employed for network management.Finally, about the telecommunications services in Colombia, the main information was in 2006: 7,823,351 (July) telephones lines in use, 32,295,306 telephones mobile cellular, and 943,628 (June) Internet users: (broadband). The Internet penetration for 2007-II Q was a 23.12%. Even though these results showed an evolution of the IS/ICT in Colombia, it is clear that Colombia still lagged behind other countries. The main problems are related with the generation, diffusion, and use of information.