Why is the Internet Slow in the Philippines

According to an index of internet speed, South Korea has the fastest internet in the world. The index also takes on quality, pricing, and consumer satisfaction. All these data are available over at netindex.com.

Top 10 Countries with Fastest Internet
The Philippines comes in as 133rd in a list of 169 countries with a depressing average of 1.68 Mbps. And that's seemingly an overstatement as many users here are surfing at speeds way below that average while South Korea, our Asian neighbor, takes the top position with a whopping average of 32.03 Mbps.

According to ISP planet, South Korea has 29 competing internet service providers. The heavy competition forces the firms to lower their prices or improve their quality of service or both. Now compare that to us where there are only 6 brands, 3 owned just by one person (MVP, owner of PLDT and Smart recently acquired Sun Cellular), and some brands providing their service only in a limited number of areas.

ISP brands in the Philippines

The government should really step back and ease the burdens on players who want to enter this market and allow this industry to flourish. I don't know the exact regulations or red tapes here in the Philippines in this market, but surely if we become more business-friendly, lower the taxes, streamline or abolish bureaucracies like the NTC, and minimize requirements and fees to enter the market, both foreign and local investors would be very willing to compete against the current brands that are providing depressing internet speeds and frustrating customer service.

But of course, fast internet is nothing without civil liberties. For instance, China has an average of 4.54 Mbps but I will never trade my slow internet for their faster yet heavily regulated and restricted internet.

There was a time when I was personally averaging at around 3.5 Mbps (you can check yours over at speedtest.net). I even have a screenshot when my torrent download speed reached 579 kbps. Now I'm back to around 0.8 Mbps. It's very frustrating and this is actually what inspired me to write this article. Aside from that, customer support is also very poor.

Faster internet will mean better education, more efficient businesses, more attractive markets to foreign investment, better economy, and of course more informative posts from this blog.

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