Communications brought MDL 3.5 bln to state budget

Moldova’s informational-communicational technologies (ICT) sector brought over MDL 3.5 bln to the state budget last year. Over the last four years, the share of ICT in the structure of the GDP has constantly increased, constituting 6.3% in 2002, 7.3% - in 2003, 7.5% - in 2004, 10.6% - in 2005. The level of the sector’s incomes amounted to 10.9% of the GDP in the first 10 months of 2006. A significant increase was registered in investments. The volume of investments in the development of the ICT exceeded one billion US dollars. The highest share of investments was placed in landline (633 mln) and mobile telephony (254.8 mln). According to the analysis of the International Telecommunications Union for 2005, the main indexes in what concerns density of landline telephony of the ICT in Moldova placed the 65th (in 2002- 88th), 108th – mobile telephony (114 – in 2002), Internet users – 79th place (116th – in 2002), personal computers – 71st place (119th – in 2002). Moldova ranks the fourth among CIS countries. Users of landline telephony amounted to one million, 29% per 100 inhabitants. In the same period, the number of mobile telephony users amounted to 1.27 mln, and the density level – 37.6%. The market of mobile telephony is shared by “Voxtel” and “Moldcell” – 69.7% to 30.3%. The highest share of the fixed telephony market is held by “Moldtelecom” (97.3%). The CDMA network was servicing 52.4 thousand customers in 2006, of which 42.6 thousand in villages. The number of Internet users increased by 92% in the first nine months of 2006 compared with previous year and amounted to 392.4 thousand.