Increase in computer literacy during 2014/2015, says DCS

The Department of Census and Statistics (DCS) said overall computer literacy in Sri Lanka has increased by 1.7 per cent from 2014 to 2015.

According to the survey, the Urban sector shows the highest computer literacy rate (40.3%) among residential sectors, while for the rural and estate sectors they are 24.9 per cent and 7.8 per cent respectively. Among the provinces with the highest level of computer literacy, the Western Province has a rate of 38.3% while the lowest percentage is reported from the Eastern Province.

In 2015, at least one computer was available for every four households in the country. This percentage was recorded at 42.0% in the Urban sector and Rural and Estate sector shows 22.0% and 5.4% respectively.

The highest availability of computers is in the Western province (38.7%), while the lowest availability is reported from Uva.

“Computer literacy among males (28.7%) is higher than that of females (25.1%) in 2015. Youths (aged 15-19 years) show the highest computer literacy rate (57.2%) among all other age groups. The age group of 50 years and above shows low computer literacy rates,” the Department said.

Computer literacy among the employed population was around 52.7 per cent in the first half of 2015 and positions such as senior officials and managers (71.3%), professionals (85.0%), technical and associate professionals (84.0%) and clerks and clerical support workers (88.2%) have higher computer literacy. However, even among the individuals engaged in elementary occupations, twenty two per cent are computer literate. The majority of those who are computer literate have received training from private institutions, schools or universities, the Department said.

The training received through the State sector is comparatively low (6.0%), however in the Estate sector this percentage is about 5.7 per cent.

11.8 per cent of the population aged 5 to 69 years used the internet at least once during the last twelve months. The Urban sector, where the facilities are largely available, shows the highest usage of both e-mail and internet among the other sectors, they said.

According to the survey it shows the high popularity of e-mail and internet among youth who are in the age group of 15- 29 years.