Information and Communication Technology
One of the few growth areas in the world economy at the moment is the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector. It is estimated that in the USA over the next 20 years there will be a short fall of millions to fill vacancies in the IT and ITC sectors. It is thus essential that other countries take up the slack. Already India and China have been very successful in attracting ICT contracts from Europe and America. It is now the time for Africa to seize these new business opportunities.
For decades Africa has been lagging behind the rest of the world in terms of average GDP and the development of a broad based economy. This is partly due to poor infrastructure, corrupt governments, banks that are keen to continue the profitable business of debt repayment, poor education systems, and the connivance of multinationals. This is all about to change.
Already companies are bidding to build more fiber optic lines to connect Africa to the rest of the world. SEACOM has laid cable all around the coast of Africa. At present it touches land at Accra in Ghana, Lagos in Nigeria, Cape Town in South Africa, Maputo in Mozambique, Dar Es Salaam in Tanzania, Mombasa in Kenya and Djibouti. Other companies are busy laying the internet infrastructures that will allow Africa to not only go online but to truly compete with the rest of the world in the ICT market place.
At the same time there has been an upsurge in mobile phone and mobile device use in Africa. There are now in place several companies providing e-banking, e-commerce, e-learning, e-democracy and e-agriculture. Africa is one of the most rapidly expanding IT sectors in the world. Its citizens are catching on very quickly to the many benefits of ICT.
Africa is well positioned to gain a growing income from Business Process Outsourcing. Not only does it have the internet infrastructure in place but it also has the language abilities. There is a vast pool of Africans who claim English, French and Portuguese as their second language. There is also a sizeable community of Mandarin speakers in Africa. These language skills will prove to be decisive in the future for African BPO prospects.
Another encouraging sign for the African ICT scene is the growing number of computer manufacturers in Africa. The number of African countries capable of making computers as well as companies producing software and other IC applications for mobiles is driving Africa on. It is no longer a continent hopelessly lagging behind the rest of the world. This image that it has will change as it begins to grab more of the global ICT business opportunities.
In terms of education, ambitious plans are underway to provide all African school children with a laptop. This can be achieved by cloud technology that allows computers to be built cheaply that still perform complex and memory heavy tasks by using the ability to store data on the cloud. It is certain that future generations of Africans will be even more computer literate.
This website is devoted to ICT topics, to African internet development and to the role that Africa can play in the global digital age.
Every continent has its own unique flavor that makes it special. And of course this character is composed of many different cultures. Thus, it is difficult to talk of Asian culture that contains such different countries as China, India, Japan and Thailand. Similarly, northern Africa with its desert and Arabian culture is very different to sub-Saharan Africa with its jungles, animals and blend of tribes and religions. Nevertheless, there are some pertinent generalizations that can be drawn about the two continents for the sake of comparison.
Firstly, there are the sterotypes. The Western world views Asia as the economic power house of the world. Japan and now China and Korea are leading the way in manufacturing industries. Asia is renowned for making cars and other high-tech goods such as computers cheaper, faster and better than the West. Today, China leads the world in terms of new patent creation. India for several years has been the brains behind many software and IT breakthroughs. Silicon Valley is full of people of Indian descent.
In contrast, Africa is seen as a backwater by the West; as a continent of basket-case economies that have been slow to enter the world stage provided by globalization. Corruption, civil war, natural disasters, draught, famine and even genocide are remembered only too well as part of Africa’s past, and perhaps part of Africa’s fate. African countries with the possible exception of South Africa have a very small manufacturing base compared to Asia.
It is not just manufacturing. From visiting the two continents it is very noticeable that small businesses abound in Asia – street stalls, noodle stands, markets, repair men on the side of the road, itinerant barbers – you name it and you can find it on the streets of many of the mega cities of Asia. In contrast, in African cities there often seems a dearth of small businesses. It leads many to think that Africans have less entrepreneurial sense than Asians. Indeed many Chinese and Indian shopkeepers have set up successfully all over Africa.
It is time that we Africans address these real and imagined deficiencies in our cultures. Bringing better information technology to Africa and showing that we can be just as innovative as the Indians and just as industrious as the Chinese is part of the task that lies ahead for Africa.
It is a common mistake to make to think that developing countries will go through a similar evolution to that experienced by the now developed countries. This is naive thinking. The industrial revolution started in England in the late Eighteenth Century. It was focused around steam power, coal and the ability to trade with a huge Empire at very profitable rates.
Now all countries have access to the combustion engine, to fossil fuel generated electricity. Several, to the chagrin of the West, have even managed to make foryas into nuclear power. Moreover, the West is no longer the factory of the world. This dubious accolade belongs to Asia, and primarily to China.
Manufactuiring is at the heart of a strong economy but this must be balanced by the need to better husband natural resources, prevent environmental deterioration and to plan for a future where water, oil, coal, metal ores, minerals, wood and food will be the most precious commodities.
This is the great irony for Africa is rich in natural resources, and yet remains very poor in terms of GDP. Africa’s natural resources are being exchanged for expensive manufactured and designed products from abroad – cars, planes, weapons, infrastructure projects and the like.
The solution is for Africa to redress this post-colonial imbalance. It must manufacture its own cars, set up its own IT services, form its own companies to make precision tooling equipment, to make electrical goods, to create aerospace parts etc. Naturally, outside know-how is necessary but the interference from outside corporate elements must be reduced as much as possible over a planned time table. This is about economic sustainability. Africa has the resources, it just needs to better use these resources. Africa used to be the richest continent in the world. It can be a real challenger for that mantle again with the correct macro management.