Metadata: Households with internet connection
Source
Survey on ICT usage in households, Statbel, Eurostat, processed by Statistics Flanders
Definitions
The data on internet access is based on the following question from the survey:
“Does anyone in your household have internet access at home (via any device)?
- Yes
- No, but used to
- No, never had.”
Until 2021, the questionnaire also asked which types of internet connections were effectively used at home. Fixed and mobile broadband were described as follows:
“Fixed broadband connection via telephone line (WiFi, ADSL, VDSL, SHDSL, or other DSL type); via cable, glassfibre, fibre, Ethernet, PLC and so on; via satellite or via a hotspot (public WiFi network) close to the home which is also accessible at home.
Mobile broadband connection (smartphone or mobile phone with internet connection from at least a 3G network or internet connection via another device with a USB key (dongle), GSM or smartphone modem or a card (for example via a desktop, laptop or tablet with an integrated SIM card)”.
One has a broadband connection if one has a fixed and/or a mobile broadband connection.
Income refers to the household’s net monthly equivalent income.
Remarks on quality
The survey on ICT and internet usage in households and by individuals is an annual survey coordinated by Eurostat in the Member States of the European Union. Statbel (the General Directorate of Statistics of Federal Public Service (FPS) Economy, Statistics Belgium) is responsible for organising the survey in Belgium and for processing the Belgian figures.
In Belgium, the sample of the ICT survey among households and individuals is a sub-sample of the Labour Force Survey (LFS). After conducting the Labour Force Survey, the interviewer asks the person in the household who has had his/her birthday most recently and is at least 16 and younger than 75 whether he/she would like to complete the ICT survey autonomously.
Since 2009, 2 methods of data collection have been used: CAWI (Computer Assisted Web Interviewing) via a web application and SAPQ (Self Administered Paper Questionnaire) via a paper form. Before 2009 the survey was conducted face to face by an interviewer. A reminder including a new questionnaire is sent if the household has not replied within 14 days.
The households eligible for the ICT survey are private households with at least one person in the age range of 16 to 75 years. Before the reform of the LFS in 2017, the second quarter was sufficient to have enough households and the fieldwork was carried out from April until the end of August. From 2017 to 2020, these are the households that participated in the continuous labour force survey for the first or second quarter. Fieldwork ran from January to the end of August. In 2021, it was decided to include an additional quarter of the labour force survey to compensate for the lower response rate. In the fourth quarter of 2020 and in the first and second quarters of 2021, households participating in the labour force survey were invited to participate in the ICT survey.
After validation, the net sample contained 6,298 households in 2023. That is 50.9% of the households that participated in the Labour Force Survey 2023 and that were eligible for the ICT survey among households and individuals on the basis of the stated age criterion, and 32.6% of the initial gross sample of the Labour Force Survey 2023 with the exclusion of the households that did not satisfy the stated age criterion. The 6,298 households that made up the net sample are spread over the 3 regions as follows: 770 from the Brussels-Capital Region, 3,362 from the Flemish Region and 2,166 from the Walloon Region.