By, Katie Dean

World governments should tax the Internet to help underdeveloped countries get access to the network, said a report released Monday by the United Nations Development Program.

"The Internet has the potential to offset inequalities in the global community, but if we don't take action it will only reinforce them," said Kate Raworth, economist and co-author of the Human Development Report. The report proposes a tax of the equivalent of one US cent on every 100 emails that an individual might send. Raworth said that had this type of program been in place in 1996, it would have generated US$70 billion in development assistance that year.

Raworth said that the UN would be in no position to enforce the tax, and that the proposal was merely a suggestion. Individual member nations will decide whether or not to adopt the idea. The proposal suggests that part of the revenue might be used to develop lower-income areas within nations, while the remaining revenue might address global development.

"If you leave it up to the market alone, we can't be sure that the Internet will spread fast enough and reach the people that really need it," said Raworth.

A representative of a Washington DC free-enterprise group calls the plan "typical UN-speak."

"What you have here is the danger that you'd be putting this tax burden on the Internet even as it grows," said Steven Allen, vice-president of communications for the Progress and Freedom Foundation. "What you'd end up doing is creating a pork barrel program administered by bureaucrats doing very little to help the poor people of the world," Allen said.

In lieu of a mandatory email tax, Allen suggested that the UN should focus on the private sector. Companies should be investing in underdeveloped countries and building the actual communications systems, he said.

Microsoft has already expanded into developing countries. In 1997, the company opened offices in South Africa, Kenya, and the Ivory Coast.

The United Nations Development Program has previously focused on the offline world. Raworth said that the group led a successful initiative in 1992 to urge governments and private donors to each spend 20 percent of their aid budget on basic human necessities like education and health care. She said that the group has previously established public centers in nations such as Egypt that train people in computer literacy, email, and Web page development.

"It is in everybody's interest to turn the Internet into a truly global communications tool," said Raworth.