UAE mobile talk time: 3,000 minutes a person

UAE mobile phone users spent nearly 23.3 billion minutes talking on their handsets in 2011, an average of 3,000 minutes per person.

The figure is far higher than the time spent on landline telephones, estimated at 4.4 billion minutes last year, according to official data.

Average spending by UAE people on mobile phones was also among the highest in the world, standing at Dh148 per month, showed the figures by the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA).

Spending on fixed lines stood at Dh138 per month, said TRAP, which supervises the UAE’s telecom sector, the second largest in the Middle East.

In a recent report, TRA said the UAE maintained its position this year as having one of the world’s highest mobile phone penetration rates of 154 per cent at the end of May.

Total mobile phone users were estimated at 12.36 million.The UAE, a major OPEC oil producer, has one of the world’s highest GDP per capita and is second only to Qatar in the Middle East.ends