Grants to access wireless broadband to double to €300 in France
The aid, which is currently €150, is especially targeted at rural areas and is to help home and businesses with equipment and installation
The recalculated grant comes as part of the ‘France Très Haut Débit’ (France at very high speed) project
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Households and businesses in France which are not covered by wireless broadband access will from April be able to access a government grant of €300 to help with equipment and installation costs.
Prime Minister Jean Castex announced that the amount available would be boosted from €150 on Saturday (February 5), and will be especially targeted at people in rural areas.
“We have observed that this sum is not sufficient to enable people to set up [wireless broadband,” he said. “We have therefore decided to go up to €300, or even €600” depending on the situation of the household in question.
The recalculated grant comes as part of the ‘France Très Haut Débit’ (France at very high speed) project, which aims to cover the whole country with very high speed broadband – at more than 30 Mbits/s – by the end of 2022.
Consumer group UFC-Que Choisir had observed in a report published in January that despite 4G coverage, 32% of households in rural areas were without “good broadband” access, or internet speeds of above eight Mbits/s.
Read more:Internet in rural France: New study shows how bad it really can be
It also found that in urban areas, internet speeds are 66% higher on average than in rural areas, reaching 55.3 Mbits/s as compared to 33.3 Mbits/s.
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Some 14.3% of users had a coverage of less than three Mbits/s, which is the minimum speed which allows access to basic internet services such as searches.
You can find out more about installing wireless broadband with the help of a government grant on this Agence nationale de la cohésion des territoires website.
This will present you with a list of operators with whom you can get in touch to determine whether you are eligible for government support. If you are, you will not have to do anything: the grant will be deducted directly from your bill.
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