Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1410761
3 NEWS 16.9.2021 FROM PAGE 1 In Malta, with an average download speed of 85.20Mbps, downloading such a 5GB HD movie would take 8m 1s. Last year, the five fastest countries had download speeds around 276 times faster than the five slowest. at gap is narrowing for the first time since the study began in 2017. is year the top five are 202 times faster than the five slowest. is indicates that the fastest countries are slowing in terms of speed growth, while the slowest countries are gathering speed. 34 of the top 50 fastest-performing countries are located in Europe (East- ern, Western and Baltics), with seven in Asia, three in the Caribbean region, four in Northern America, one in Sub-Saha- ran Africa and one in Oceania. By contrast, 31 of the 50 slowest-per- forming countries are located in Sub-Saharan or Northern Africa, six are in Asia, four are in the Near East, two are in the CIS region, five are in Ocean- ia, and one each in South America and the Caribbean region. 94 countries failed to achieve average speeds of 10Mbps or greater, the speed considered to be the minimum required to cope with the needs of a typical fam- ily or small business. is is down from 109 countries in 2020, indicating sig- nificant speed improvements in many parts of the world. Northern Africa Northern Africa recorded the low- est overall internet speeds as a col- lective region, with all six qualifying countries in the bottom half of the ta- ble. Mauritania (2.54Mbps) recorded the slowest speed in 203rd place, fol- lowed by Algeria (3.08Mbps, 194th), and Libya (3.73Mbps, 188th). Morocco (10.33Mbps, 129th), Tunisia (7.46Mbps, 153rd), and Egypt (6.94Mbps, 162nd) offered the fastest speed in the region. Sub-Sahara 49 countries were measured in the sec- ond-slowest region Sub-Saharan Africa, 46 of which found themselves in the lowest 50% of countries in the league ta- ble. Going against the trend somewhat were Réunion (43.62Mbps, 50th), South Africa (19.94Mbps, 90th), and Mada- gascar (16.28Mbps, 105th). Meanwhile, Ethiopia (1.20Mbps, 222nd), Guinea Bissau (1.24Mbps, 221st), Equatorial Guinea (1.30Mbps, 220th), South Sudan (1.40Mbps, 218th), Djibouti (1.46Mbps, 216th), and Somalia (1.59Mbps, 215th) all fell within the bottom ten countries in the world for network speed. Central America Most Central American countries found themselves toward the middle of the league table. e region as a whole has an average speed of 16.03Mbps, but there are winners and losers in the re- gion. e fastest average speeds can be found in Panama (30.58Mbps, 72nd), Belize (23.12Mbps, 79th), and Costa Rica (19.02Mbps, 97th). Meanwhile, Honduras (7.17Mbps, 159th), Nicara- gua (9.75Mbps, 134th), and Guatemala (9.85Mbps, 133rd) all performed com- paratively poorly. Asia 27 countries were measured in the Asia region, which clocked in a region- al average speed of 29.11Mbps. e fastest average speeds were measured in Macau (128.56Mbps, 7th), Singa- pore (97.61Mbps, 11th), and Japan (96.36Mbps, 13th). Democratic Repub- lic of Timor-Leste (1.33Mbps, 219th), Afghanistan (1.41Mbps, 217th), and China (2.06Mbps, 209th) were the slow- est in the region, with Timor-Leste and Afghanistan finding themselves in the bottom ten countries in the world. South America e 13 countries measured in South America span from the middle to the lower end of the table, with a region- al average speed of 13.02Mbps. e fastest internet in South America can be found in Brazil (33.34Mbps, 68th), Uruguay (21.73Mbps, 82nd), Para- guay (19.41Mbps, 94th). Venezuela (2.62Mbps, 201st), Bolivia (7.36Mbps, 157th), and Suriname (7.44Mbps, 156th) were the slowest in the region. Oceania Of the 15 qualifying countries in Oceania, most were in the bottom half of the speed table. e region has an overall average of 16.95Mbps. Leading the regional table here is New Zealand (85.95Mbps, 20th), which trounces second-place (in the region) Australia (40.50Mbps, 55th), and New Caledo- nia (31.79Mbps, 69th). e slowest in the region were the Federated States of Micronesia (1.63Mbps, 214th), Va- nuatu (2.90Mbps, 198th) and Palau (4.48Mbps, 182nd). CIS Of the 11 CIS (former USSR) na- tions in the table, most can be found from the middle of the table down- wards. e region had an average speed of 12.87Mbps. e top-three fastest nations in the region were Rus- sian Federation (35.73Mbps, 66th), Ukraine (25.26Mbps, 77th), and Belarus (19.86Mbps, 92nd). e slowest coun- tries in the region were Turkmenistan (also slowest in the world – 0.50Mbps, 224th), Tajikistan (1.82Mbps, 211th) and Kazakhstan (5.83Mbps, 173rd). Both Tajikistan and Turkmenistan were among the slowest ten places in the world. Western Europe All 29 countries measured in Western Europe were in the top half of the table, with countries in the region taking eight of the top ten spots in the world for in- ternet speed. e regional average speed of 90.56Mbps makes it the fastest of the 13 global regions overall. Impressive av- erage speeds were measured for region- al top-three Jersey (274.27Mbps, 1st in the world), Liechtenstein (211.26Mbps, 2nd) and Iceland (191.83Mbps, 3rd). e slowest places in the region were Faroe Islands (21.59Mbps, 83rd), Guernsey (31.20Mbps, 71st), and Italy (36.69Mbps, 61st). North America Five countries were measured in Northern America, all of which were in the top quarter of the table. e re- gion as a whole has an average speed of 71.68Mbps. Bermuda (96.54Mbps, 12th) and the United States (92.42Mbps, 14th) led the region with impres- sive averages. Meanwhile, Canada (79.96Mbps, 24th), Saint Pierre and Mi- quelon (47.92Mbps, 48th), and Green- land (41.56Mbps, 52nd) were the slow- est in the region, but none of them were 'slow' compared to the rest of the world. Near East The 15 countries in the Near East measured for this year's speed league table span the middle to the bottom of the table. The average speed for the region is 15.38Mbps. The fastest coun- tries were Israel (34.97Mbps, 67th), United Arab Emirates (29.90Mbps, 73rd) and Cyprus (28.30Mbps, 76th). The slowest were Yemen (0.68Mbps, 223rd), Syrian Arab Republic (1.67Mbps, 213th) and Palestine (3.65Mbps, 190th). Eastern Europe ere are 16 qualifying countries in the Eastern Europe region, all of which are in the top half of the table, with one (Hun- gary) making it into the top ten, and six others in the top 50. Overall the region averages 46.22Mbps. e fastest three were Hungary (104.07Mbps, 10th), Ro- mania (67.40Mbps, 29th) and Slovenia (67.20Mbps, 30th). e slowest three were North Macedonia (15.38Mbps, 107th), Albania (19.36Mbps, 96th), and Kosovo (22.21Mbps, 81st). The Baltics e Baltics, comprising three quali- fying countries, ranked entirely within the top 50, and have an overall region- al average of 68.06Mbps. Estonia fared best in 22nd place overall and with an average speed of 84.72Mbps. Lithu- ania (56.17Mbps, 37th), and Latvia (63.28Mbps, 33rd) followed behind fair- ly closely. The Caribbean Overall the Caribbean region fared well for what are essentially island na- tions, with three of its 27 countries fea- turing in the top 50 fastest countries in the world. Overall, the region offers a re- spectable 26.40Mbps on average. At the faster end, Cayman Islands (71.47Mbps, 27th), Aruba (70.66Mbps, 28th), and Barbados (55.92Mbps, 38th) led the way, while Cuba (2.92Mbps, 196th), Sint Maarten (6.15Mbps, 170th), and Antigua and Barbuda (8.69Mbps, 141st) were the slowest. Research is research is an open source pro- ject with contributors from civil society organisations, educational institutions, and private sector companies. M-Lab is led by teams based at Code for Sci- ence and Society, New America's Open Technology Institute, Google, Prince- ton University's PlanetLab, and other supporting partners. Downloading a 5GB HD movie in Malta takes an average of 8m 1s