It always is difficult to determine the impact of any technology in any industry. But one technique is to estimate the total sales value of end products, and then try and impute value contributed by various parts of the underlying value chain.
When looking at e-commerce, the total value of goods sold provides a baseline from which to deduce market share of sales, for example. So revenue for Amazon or any other retailer, or revenue for a transaction processor, is some percentage of sales.
Some have argued that availability of fiber to the home affects home prices, for example. Perhaps the methodology includes comparing home sales prices in areas where FTTH is available, versus areas where FTTH is not available.
Of course, there are other logical explanations. In many cases, FTTH is deployed in neighborhoods where the highest demand is believed to exist.
And predictors of demand include home value, homeowner income or education level. You see the problem: FTTH deployment might simply reflect expectations of buying behavior based on higher incomes or higher education.
With that caveat, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has produced some estimates of the impact of broadband in precision agriculture. With the caveat that value might be produced by internet of things technologies and services that are supported by broadband facilities, the USDA models significant value.
Some of the imputed value comes from use of sensors and automated farming processes, some from more generalized information tools and retailing methods.
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