Energy Crunch Is Siphoning Off Internet Usage in Brazil

Jul 16 2001

After years of sustained growth, the development of the Internet in Brazil seems to have temporarily peaked because of the country's ongoing efforts to conserve energy, according to a report released Monday.

The total amount of time spent online in Brazil, Latin America's biggest online market, declined 6.5 percent and unique users remained flat in June compared with May, according to Jupiter Media Metrix, a research and ratings company. People logging on from home slipped to 5.866 million unique users from 5.87 million and the average amount of time surfers spent on the Web fell to 56.9 minutes per day from 57.3 minutes per day, according to the report.

Researchers blamed the fall on the country's efforts to cut energy consumption. Since the beginning of last month, Brazilians have responded to the government's plea for energy rationing by dimming their lights, turning off their water supply and unplugging some of many of their appliance, including computers.

"The flat growth in unique users and decline in total time spent online reflects the population's effort to reduce electricity consumption as part of the nation's concerted effort to reduce consumption," the report read.

Brazilians are being asked to reduce energy consumption by 20 percent, a goal that Chief of Staff Pedro Parente – dubbed the "Blackout Minister" – says is being met. The country's conservation efforts have so far kept at bay California-like rolling blackouts, which would hobble the growth prospects of Latin America's biggest economy.

Already, government agencies have cut back on energy consumption by more than 35 percent by turning off some street lights and cutting back on the illumination of public buildings and monuments. In a sign of just how serious the crisis is, nighttime soccer games have been banned for the duration of the energy crisis.

Jupiter Media Metrix expects the setback in the growth of the Internet to be temporary. "The next couple of months will show similar trends with respect to overall usage," according to the report. "But we continue to expect significant positive growth in the membership ranks of the leading paying ISPs."

Analyst Lucas Graves says he sees the number of cybersurfers reaching 34 million in 2006, more than twice the 16 million that he forecasts for the end of this year.