France Plans 20-Billion Euro National Broadband Plan 178
judgecorp writes "France is planning a €20 billion programme to get super-fast broadband to its rural population. About half the funds will come from government investment, and President Hollande believes the work will create 10,000 jobs. Half the population should have fast broadband in the next five years, and the whole country in ten years. France is at a disadvantage for broadband as it is a large country with a lot of rural areas. However, it also has a more left-leaning government willing to take on infrastructure projects."
Editors.... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:France is a large country? (Score:1, Informative)
You call that a large country with a lot of rural areas? Now this [wikipedia.org] is a large country with a lot of rural areas!
Sorry to nit pick, but much of Australia's enormous land mass is classified as *remote* rather than *rural*.
I don't imagine there's much in the way of "remote" areas in France (and yes, Australia is much larger than France), so your point stands.
But somehow I doubt that the proportion of "rural" land in Australia is higher than it is in France.
Re:France is a large country? (Score:5, Informative)
You call that a large country with a lot of rural areas?
By European standards, France is a large country (roughly 1000km across), with some rather sparsely populated areas [wikipedia.org] (the Northern Alps and the Massif Central). France also has a strong tradition of massive, nation-wide infrastructure projects (we've had a comprehensive high-speed train network [wikipedia.org] since the 1980s), so a nation-wide broadband infrastructure is a natural thing to do.
Now this [wikipedia.org] is a large country with a lot of rural areas!
That thing is continent-sized, not country-sized.
Re:France is a large country? (Score:5, Informative)
According to Nationmaster [nationmaster.com], Australia has 490 million hectares of arable land, while France has 185 million. Environmental Knowledge Systems Australia (EKSA) [targeton.com] says that 400 million hectares of Australian land is actively used for agriculture.
Even if France used all of its arable land, it still wouldn't come close to Australia.
Re:Editors.... (Score:4, Informative)
Hollande!
And they're only planning to make a plan, according to the story title.
Editors, indeed!