China In Mobile Frenzy
The Age
Friday February 9, 2001
BEIJING
The incessant cacophony of mobile telephones across China can now be partly explained by sheer weight of numbers.
According to figures released yesterday, the number of mobile telephones doubled in China last year. There are now 85.26 million handsets across the country. This puts China second only to the United States in mobile usage.
A Ministry of Information Industry report said that there were more mobile than fixed-line connections for the first time last year. Seven per cent of Chinese now sport a mobile phone. By 2005, analysts predict, there will be 250million mobiles in China, making it by far the world's largest market.
Telephone installation in China has historically been notoriously difficult - sometimes taking years - and costly. Now, many new users are bypassing fixed-line phones in favor of mobiles.
Even so, spurred in part by the growing popularity of the Internet, landlines also increased last year, by 36.5million to 144 million.
The spread of telephones in China is uneven. In the country's vast rural areas, only one in five people has a phone. In urban areas, almost 40per cent have a fixed phone.
On the down side, telephone use in China remains comparatively expensive. Mobile users are charged for calls they make and those they receive. Until the mid-1990s, giant China Telecom was the country's monopoly provider of phone services. Other companies have since entered the market in the mobile sector.
© 2001 The Age
