Bridging the digital divide: Farmers, students, rural small businesses need broadband

WASHINGTON — Now more than ever, rural America needs access to the internet.

A panel of farmers, businessmen, educators and other experts spoke up about the topic during a webinar June 9.

“Farmers having the availability to utilize technology and use it to its greatest potential is going to have a significant impact moving forward,” said RJ Karney, director of congressional relations for the American Farm Bureau Federation.

“We’re talking about things like soil health, plant health, being able to monitor your livestock and cattle to help with the animal. There’s great potential here when discussing broadband and precision agriculture.”

Karney also noted Congress took commendable action to fix faulty broadband mapping data earlier this year and now must provide the Federal Communications Commission the funding needed to implement those changes.

Inaccurate maps have been one of the greatest hurdles in getting broadband funding to areas that need it most, Karney said.

The digital divide affects more than just farmers. Education and health care are taking a hit, as well.

“It just hurts me to see that education for many students in this country ended in mid-March because of a lack of broadband,” said Betsy Huber, president of the National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry. “They weren’t able to complete the school year with learning.

“Rural areas don’t have the healthcare providers that urban areas do. And when you’re afraid to go to the doctor or don’t have that option, then it’s even worse in this time.

“The doctors can do so much by internet, by telehealth.”

Huber encouraged action to expand access to broadband now, not in five years.

Jordan Crenshaw, executive director of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Technology Engagement Center, explained that lack of broadband is affecting small businesses, as well.

“Rural small businesses are trying to innovate. The problem is it’s a connectivity issue,” he said. “We’ve only seen 20% of rural small businesses actually generate the vast majority of their selling of products and services online.

“If we actually have full adoption of digital tools for rural small businesses, we’d actually see an additional $74 billion in sales per year, an addition of $41 billion in GDP and we’d actually add at least 300,000 jobs to the economy.”

Crenshaw emphasized the importance of congressional action to deploy targeted, timely resources to tackle specific needs like the homework gap.

He also pointed to the importance of updating America’s regulatory landscape to protect consumers and unleash private-sector innovation to help close the digital divide.

“There should be an effort to put funds in places where there are unserved communities, to make sure we’re efficiently spending that money and also when it comes to broadband policy in general, making sure we have a regulatory framework in place that’s designed for the 21st century,” Crenshaw said.

Learn more at www.connectamericansnow.com.