Rapport d'enquête sur l'adoption du commerce électronique par les PME québécoises

It is within the framework of the new ISQ statistical program devoted to the Knowledge-Based Economy that the Enquête sur l'adoption du commerce électronique par les PME québécoises was carried out in December 2000 and January 2001 among a cross-section of 2 655 Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SME) of Québec. The definition suggested by the OECD in summer 2000 to measure the use of electronic commerce was retained for the purpose of this survey in order to support comparisons on an international level. This definition refers to "reception of orders by way of the Internet - these orders being paid online or not".

More precisely, the survey gathered information on the following subjects :

• use of a computer;
• connection to the Internet and expectations of connection by January 2002;
• presence on the Web and expectations of information dissemination on the Web by January 2002;
• practice of EDI ( electronic data interchange );
• orders made by way of the Internet;
• reception of orders by way of the Internet;
• characteristics of SME receiving orders by Internet (use of cryptography software, types of online customers, possibility of payment online);
• reasons why some SME don't expect to allow the ordering of their products and services online.

Results are broken down according to three size categories of SME (1 to 4 employees; 5 to 9 employees; 10 to 200 employees) and five sectional regroupings which represent the whole of the private sector.