"They are experiencing what my mother experienced some 100 years ago," Yoshio Utsumi, secreary general of the International Telecommunications Union, said. He hoped the situation will be improved with the joint efforts of the international community.

Muhamad Tunus, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize 2006, said information technology can play "an exciting role" in helping the poor out of poverty. It needs collected efforts in the ICT communities to achieve the United Nations' target of reducing the poor population by half in 2015.

(For more biz stories, please visit Industry Updates)