<div><em>Giving people free basic services will help overcome some of the fundamental challenges with internet access in India, <strong>Kevin Martin</strong> writes</em></div><div> </div><div>While the net neutrality debate rages, we are at risk of losing sight of the real reason we should all be concerned. More than 1 billion people in India remain offline and over 70 million rural households face some form of exclusion, either from assets or socio-economic benefits. The debate should be about how we can work together and try different ideas to connect one billion Indians and close the exclusion gap. </div><div> </div><div>That’s been our intention with Internet.org from the very start. Our goal is to introduce people to the value of being online for the first time, overcoming the technical, cost and content challenges that exist, to offer free basics services and give them an easy path to start paying for and using the internet.</div><div> </div><div>It is not THE internet, but rather an application that is helping to bring people online and show them the value of being online to help accelerate Internet adoption. And it is achieving just that. Internet.org brings new users onto mobile networks on average over 50% faster after launching free basic services. In addition, more than half of the people who come online through Internet.org are paying for data and exploring the internet within the first 30 days. </div><div> </div><div>This week marks our one-year anniversary of Internet.org free basic services. Since then we’ve heard many incredible stories of how the internet is changing lives and communities. In Dhaka, Bangladesh, one man used Social Blood, a free service available on Internet.org, to post a request for nine units of A+ blood for his wife's labour. Within a couple of hours, 12 strangers had offered blood for his wife's operation.</div><div> </div><div>Over the last year and since our first launch in Zambia, we’ve incorporated everything we’ve heard thus far in making free basic services a sustainable program for developers, operators and the people of India.</div><div> </div><div>In April we opened up the Internet.org Platform to allow developers to easily create services for the billions who are not connected to the internet and to also give people more choice over the free basic services they use. We want to work with as many developers and entrepreneurs as possible to extend the benefits of connectivity to diverse, local communities. To provide valuable basic services that the already connected take for granted: tools for education, healthcare, jobs and local news. The results speak for themselves. In the past month, health services were accessed over a million times within Internet.org. Consider this potential within the context of India, where only around 25% have access to healthcare services.</div><div> </div><div>We also want to work with as many mobile operators as possible to bring access to relevant basic services to the unconnected. Over the past 12 months we’ve worked closely with more than a dozen mobile operators across 17 countries to give people access to relevant basic internet services without data charges, and today Internet.org is available to more than a billion people. Starting this week, any operator can turn on Internet.org free basic services using our technical tools and best practices, available to operators through our portal. This investment is allowing us to scale the program globally so that any mobile operator can sign up through our portal to launch Internet.org free basic services and grow the number of people coming online.</div><div> </div><div>Here in India we have seen first-hand how the internet can transform a nation. We have seen farmers and fishermen become more productive by tracking weather conditions and comparing wholesale prices through their mobile phone. Or how mobile technology can be used to deliver primary health and dental care. At a macro level, it is estimated that increased connectivity in India could create 65 million new jobs, double GDP growth, lower extreme poverty by 16% and child mortality by 14%. While the government’s Digital India plan is transforming the country into a digitally empowered society, with a growth curve that mirrors that of the US a few years ago, and China more recently.</div><div> </div><div>We believe that giving people free basic services will help overcome some of the fundamental challenges with internet access in India today. Yes cost is a barrier – many people who have access to the internet can’t afford it. Infrastructure also poses a major challenge in India, where 69% of the population lives in rural areas and many still don’t have a cell tower near them. But potentially the greatest hurdle is education. People who haven’t experienced the internet before have no idea what it is or how to use it. We need to help people understand the possibilities available to them online.</div><div> </div><div>Now surely this is what we should all be focused on? Let’s not deny people that opportunity but rather work together to unleash the social and economic opportunities the Internet can deliver.</div><div> </div><div><em>Kevin Martin is vice president of mobile and global access policy at Facebook</em></div>
